


Dead Ends and Second Chances

by Azure_Lynx



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Equal parts Adventure and Feelings, Everyone's adults and it's 1993, Found Family, I just shoved em in a blender and poured out what I liked, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Domestic Violence, Including a few slurs which will be tagged for, Multi, Nonbinary Max Mayfield, Period-Typical Homophobia, Pining, Polyamory, S1/S2 Rewrite Kind of?, Second Chances, The Upside Down, There's a bunch of warnings but I promise to actually sort them by chapter, mentions of police brutality and racism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-07
Updated: 2020-11-06
Packaged: 2021-03-09 04:42:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 86,772
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27378904
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Azure_Lynx/pseuds/Azure_Lynx
Summary: Nothing ever happens in dead-end Hawkins, Indiana, until one morning in November 1993 when *everything* happens. When his best friend goes missing and leaves a twelve-year-old girl instead, Mike Wheeler must shed his Waffle House waiter blandness and reunite with old friends to rescue Will in a grand adventure. Nancy Wheeler’s tangled love life and stagnant career get a shot of adrenaline as she chases government conspiracies with the two men she loves. And Kali Prasad, who ran out of Hawkins and never looked back, finally returns  with her new family to the lab she escaped 12 years ago, this time to end things for good.
Relationships: Claudia Henderson/Susan Hargrove, Jim "Chief" Hopper/Joyce Byers/Karen Wheeler, Jonathan Byers/Nancy Wheeler, Jonathan Byers/Steve Harrington, Jonathan Byers/Steve Harrington/Nancy Wheeler, Joyce Byers/Jim "Chief" Hopper, Joyce Byers/Karen Wheeler, Lucas Sinclair/Mike Wheeler, Maxine "Max" Mayfield/Lucas Sinclair, Maxine "Max" Mayfield/Lucas Sinclair/Mike Wheeler, Maxine "Max" Mayfield/Mike Wheeler, Mick/Kali Prasad, Steve Harrington/Nancy Wheeler, Will Byers/Dustin Henderson
Comments: 14
Kudos: 13
Collections: Stranger Things Rare Pair Big Bang 2020





	1. Who the fuck is this Kid, and where the fuck is Will?

**Author's Note:**

> Hi hello and welcome to my contribution to the 2020 Stranger Things Rarepair big Bang! Thank you to [Pterawaters](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pterawaters/pseuds/pterawaters) for the [lovely soundtrack](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0wkWDYQBCCyLCpJyxe2c0l?si=8o45PWGrTEibS4M0dRHoeQ) that accompanies this fic!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi and welcome! Warnings for this chapter: blood and references to child abuse.   
> Note: Moppy is the gender-neutral parenting title I have bestowed upon Max.

**October 2015**

“Okay, I’m just saying, if you’re going to have a portal to an alternate dimension, it’s obviously going to be in a Waffle House.”

“Nuh-uh, don’t be ridiculous. It’s just a diner.”

“It’s not _just_ a diner, it’s a liminal space! C’mon, Moppy, back me up!”

“Your sister’s right.”

“Max! Don’t encourage them! We don’t talk about Waffle House around -”

“Did someone say Waffle House?”

“...Mike.”

“Yeah, Dad. I’m saying if there was a portal to an alternate dimension, it’d be in a Waffle House.”

“You’re right, that’s where it was.”

“Oh Jesus Christ Mike -”

“What? They’re old enough.”

“Sure, but you’re weirdly intense about it.”

“Lucas, it’s not weirdly intense, there was a fucking government conspiracy -”

“Language!”

“Oh my god, Lucas, they’ve heard so much worse. There was a government conspiracy and my best friend was trapped in an alternate dimension, it’s an intense story!”

“Dad, _what_ are you talking about?”

“Okay, so it was November of 1993…”

* * *

Mike used to hate night shifts, but after four months of coy smiles exchanged with the person he’d come to think of as The Doctor, he didn’t hate it nearly so much. Mostly because he got to see them. And he was the only waiter on shift, so he was the one who topped up their coffee and offered small bits of inane chatter as they hunched over their textbooks. 

They always arrived before Mike’s shift started, but they usually stayed until just minutes before his shift _ended_ , and he wanted to flatter himself into thinking it was on purpose.

It had been raining outside earlier. Mike had been so glad his car started, that he didn’t have to walk to work and get drenched, and though he’d never admit it, that he wouldn’t show up in front of The Doctor looking like a drowned rat. 

Someone who accused Mike of having a crush wouldn’t be wrong. 

Their mug was nearing empty, so Mike came over with a smile that he hoped was charming and went to pour some more coffee. 

“Exam coming up?” he started to ask.

The power went out. 

That was usually a bad sign. Mike was pretty sure their back-up generator had a back-up generator; the only other time the power had gone out, a tree had crushed the kitchen and they’d had to close and rebuild. 

Mike and The Doctor stared at each other for an uncertain second. The sickly fluorescent lights flickered back on, and they shrugged at each other. They flickered again, off for three seconds and on for five and then off again, and Mike wondered if he needed to go kick said generator. But when they came back, they came back for good, so he put it out of his mind.

Probably just leftover weird from the storm earlier. Hardly the first bizarre thing that ever happened at work.

The moment had passed, and though the Doctor looked at him expectantly, Mike found himself tongue-tied. He just smiled very awkwardly and scurried away to his other table, full of teenagers who were definitely high and decided they needed Waffle House at exactly this moment.  
It was fine. He still had a couple hours left to figure out something smooth to say. He’d work on it.

* * *

Will had been sitting on his porch for the last hour and a half, just looking up at the stars and sketching the forest around him. When he’d started, it had been pouring rain, but now the rain had let up and it was quiet, save for the forest life and the wind. 

The sensible thing to do would be to go to bed. Or more accurately, the sensible thing would have been to go to bed two hours ago, because it was a school night and he was going to be tired as hell in front of his class tomorrow (today?), but the _second_ most sensible would be to do it now. 

He didn’t.

He just had...a feeling. Something was telling him to stay up. 

It wasn’t that he was waiting for Mike - Mike would be getting home not too long before Will was getting ready for work. He’d stopped trying to wait up for Mike after the third night shift. And he wasn’t expecting a call, either, because his feeling said, “Be outside.”

When Will was in high school, Dustin always used to tease him about having ‘True Sight,’ like from their D&D games. Lucas and Mike got in on it, and sometimes even Max, but they didn’t _believe_ the way Dustin seemed to. He was all about weird shit, conspiracies and cryptids and psychic powers. 

“You sense things before they happen, dude!” Dustin had said on more than one occasion. “That’s literally what being psychic means!”

Will preferred to think of it as a combination of anxiety and people skills. He knew what the bullies would do or where they’d be because he knew _them_ , so of course he could avoid them. It was easy to know when your teachers would give pop quizzes if you paid attention. 

But some things were harder to write off, like when Barb Holland had gone missing 12 years ago. Will never told anyone about that, but he had known something bad was going to happen with Mike’s sister and her friend. His feeling said he should tell Mike, or Nancy, or somebody. 

He thought that feeling was stupid, and he ignored it, and then Barb Holland was gone the next day. He hadn’t ignored a feeling since.

There were twigs snapping in the forest and dead leaves disintegrating, making sounds like a macabre party noisemaker. Will put his sketchbook down, straining to see between the trees. 

There was something out there. Two somethings, according to the feeling in his gut.

“Hello?” he called tentatively, rising to his feet. He took a few steps towards the woods, off his porch and alongside the dirt drive. “Who’s there?”

It turned out to be a child in a bloodied hospital gown, who looked at Will with big, terrified eyes as they broke through the tree line. The only noises he could hear were terrified gasps as the kid stumbled closer and a continued crackling from behind them. 

This was not good. 

Will wasn’t fast, but he was a teacher, and he blamed that for his ability to sprint in the name of protecting a kid.

“Go, go, go!” he encouraged, shoving the kid. “Get inside, lock the door.” They followed his directions and he ran to the shed to get his rifle. Did he enjoy shooting? No. But it was useful to have in the forests around Hawkins, especially for whatever the hell had scared the kid so badly. A mountain lion, maybe? They occasionally got those around here. 

When it emerged from the woods, Will concluded it was _not_ a mountain lion. It was - something incomprehensible, really, like someone had drawn a human body with an alligator head and gotten everything wrong. And it was moving _fast_. 

The back of his neck tingled and he fired off a shot. It hit the creature in the shoulder but seemed to do no damage, only enrage the thing further. What Will had thought of as an alligator head quickly unfurled like the leaves of a flower, revealing rows upon rows of barbed-wire sharp teeth. The thing screamed and reached out for him.

_Shit._

* * *

The sun wouldn’t be up for another two hours, which meant Mike could maybe manage to fall asleep before it was bright out, assuming he hightailed it home. 

Of course, The Doctor was yawning and packing their stuff, so he didn’t rush. He waited to walk out with them, which earned him an eye roll and a smile.

“Isn’t it hard to go to class if you’re studying til 5am?” Mike asked. It was a question that’d occurred to him before, but he’d never had the courage to ask before now.

They shrugged. “I don’t have classes on Friday. I prefer to sleep during the day.”

Mike nodded. “Yeah, me too.” 

The Doctor raised an eyebrow at him with a small smile and he felt himself blush. He didn’t have classes _any_ day.

“Uh. Drive safe!” he encouraged, sliding into the front seat of his third-hand car. They rode a motorcycle, because of course they did, and he stared as they rode off with a backwards salute. He watched their denim jacket recede into the distance and put his head down on the steering wheel. “Ugh. _Dumbass!_ ”

It took two tries to get the engine to turn over, but when it did, Mike was out of there. He’d have to talk to Will about saving up for a better one, one that wasn’t quite so old. If it came down to it, he’d go to Nancy (or more accurately, Steve, her husband with the actual nice paycheck) and see if they could help, but Mike would really rather not. 

He didn’t exactly enjoy asking for money.

Mike wondered where his dad had fucked off to. There was a man Mike wouldn’t mind asking for help, seeing as all Ted Wheeler ever had done was pay for things. But he’d bought a sports car and left town right after Mike’s mom divorced him, with no forwarding address, so that was unhelpful, even if unsurprising.

His mom couldn’t afford the house without her (now ex) husband, so she’d sold it and moved in with Joyce. It had just seemed sensible, at the time. But the house money wasn’t enough for him _and_ Nancy to go to college along with taking care of Holly, and it sure as hell wasn’t enough to go asking his mom for favors. She and Joyce were just barely getting by, with help from Jonathan’s income, too.

Sometimes, Mike really missed being middle class.

He pulled the car into the dirt driveway, shutting it off and praying it’d start for Will in an hour and a half. If not, Will could probably call Dustin for a ride, but it wasn’t a risk Mike wanted to set him up for. 

The house was still dark, which meant Will was probably stealing a few more precious minutes of sleep. Mike tried to be as quiet as he could so as not to wake his friend, but when he passed the living room, he came face to face with a twelve-year-old clutching one of their kitchen knives. Forgetting anything about being quiet, he let out a very emphatic, “ _What the fuck?_ ”

Then, in case that hadn’t woken him up, Mike shouted his name for good measure. “ _Will!_ ”

The kid shook their head. “Gone,” they said simply.

“What do you mean ‘gone?’” Mike demanded. “Stay here,” he added, as if they had anywhere to go.

He completed a circuit of the small house - it didn’t take long - and came to the conclusion that Will had never even gone to bed last night.

He came back to the living room. “Okay, well, if he’s gone, how did you get here? Where did he go?”

“Saved me.” They looked up at him as if that clarified everything. 

He sighed, exhausted. “Okay. My name’s Mike,” he tried, gesturing at himself. “What’s your name?”

They blinked owlishly. 

“I’m Will’s friend,” he tried. “I can help you.” 

Slowly, the kid extended their left arm and tapped a tattoo on their wrist with the flat side of the knife. Blocky digits, 011.

“Eleven,” Mike tried. “What does that mean?” The kid gestured to themself. “You’re Eleven? Like, years old?” They shook their head. “It’s your name?” he tried, finally getting a relieved nod. 

He took a step closer. Eleven raised the knife at him. “No,” they said firmly.

“Okay. Do you have parents?” he asked. “Someone I should call?”

“No,” they said again, somehow stronger and weaker at the same time. “Papa...is a bad man.”

Shit. This was really not something Mike was equipped to deal with. “Okay,” he said slowly. “I’m going to go get you some food, alright? You just...stay here.”

When he made sure he was out of sight in the kitchen, he thanked God for cordless phones, even if they weren’t always great. “Dustin!” he hissed into the receiver. 

“Michael Theodore Wheeler, it is not even six o’clock in the morning, this had better be good.” Dustin somehow always managed to sound a mix of annoyed and chipper at this time of day, even when he’d apparently been sleeping. 

“There’s a kid in my living room.”

“A kid?”

“Yes, a kid. In a fucking blood-stained hospital gown who said Will saved them - but Will is _not here_ \- and that their dad is a bad person.”

“What am _I_ supposed to do about it?”

“You’re a teacher!” Mike nearly shouted, but he lowered his voice. “I don’t know how to deal with a twelve-year-old - I mean, I think they’re twelve? I don’t know how to tell.”

Dustin sighed. “Oh, Jesus Christ, Michael. Yeah, okay, I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

“Thank you.” Mike exhaled in relief and hung up. Then he remembered he’d promised to feed the kid, but he had no idea what a kid should actually be eating.

He settled on some toast and a banana. That seemed healthy, and his mom probably wouldn’t yell at him for giving it to Holly, so it was fine, right? 

“Here.” He handed her the plate and a cup of water. “This should help.”

The plate went in her lap, and she used one hand to sip the water while the other continued to white-knuckle the knife. It made Mike anxious; he didn’t want her to hurt herself.

“Can you just...give me that…” He reached out slowly. Eleven jerked the knife towards him. “Whoa, whoa! Calm down, kid.”

God, he really didn’t know what to do with a child. It was a good thing Dustin had answered because otherwise his next call would’ve been to his mother and she would _not_ have been happy about him acquiring a random twelve-year-old at five a.m.

Though she had been rather insistent with Nancy on the concept of grandkids lately...

He reached out again, tentatively. “You need another hand for your toast,” he reasoned. They still looked at him suspiciously, but it was a convincing enough argument that they let him take the knife and put it off to the side on the coffee table. They lifted up their toast and took a bite, then sipped the water again.

“So, where are you from?” Mike asked conversationally. 

Eleven shook her head. “Bad place.”

Bad place, bad man...this was not painting a good picture in Mike’s head.

Mike hadn’t remembered to lock the door, so Dustin just waltzed right in. “I’m here, Michael!” he announced, not bothering to kick off his boots. “So where’s this - oh, holy _shit_.”

Eleven, freaked out by the new arrival, shoved as far back into the couch as possible, dropping the water and plate as they threw their hands in front of their face to protect themself.

Mike groaned. At least they’d finished the toast, even if there were now crumbs all over the floor in a pool of what little water was left.

“ _Dustin_ ,” he chastised.

Eleven continued to stare at the newcomer warily, then accusingly at Mike. He wanted to say he hadn’t done anything, but he had invited Dustin over. 

“Introduce yourself,” he demanded, then headed to the kitchen to grab a cleaning rag. He took the knife with him as an afterthought, though he could feel Eleven glaring at the back of his head. 

While he was in the kitchen, he figured he may as well do a quick check and see if Will was with his mom. Jonathan had an early shift today, so it wasn’t super rude to call at this time of day, but when he blearily answered the phone, he told Mike that Will was not there and that he hadn’t said anything. Another dead end.

Somehow, even though he was only gone for a couple minutes, Mike returned to find Dustin sitting cross-legged on the ground and chatting animatedly with Eleven. The child looked far less wary than before. 

Dustin turned around. “Mike, this is Eleven,” he introduced, like Mike hadn’t already done that part. “She was running from a monster in the woods and Will saved her, but then the monster took Will.”

“Monster?” Mike raised his eyebrows in disbelief. “Like, a mountain lion?”

The child - a girl, apparently, though Mike hadn’t wanted to assume - shook her head. “Monster,” she said again, solemnly.

“Right. So you know that big creepy old building a mile down from your Waffle House?”

“It’s not _my_ Waffle House.”

“Sure it is. The government looking building, has a sign for the Department of Energy or something?” Dustin waved his hands. “That’s where she escaped and ran from, and that’s where the monster followed her from. Though I haven’t figured out why she was in that building in the first place.”

“Papa.” She shivered. “Bad man.”

Dustin shrugged. “That doesn’t clarify much for me.” She didn’t seem to care.

“Dustin?” Mike bit out. “A word?”

He yanked Dustin into the kitchen. “You can’t be taking this seriously,” he hissed. “A monster? Kidnapped Will?”

“Well, she could mean she was running from a metaphorical monster.” Dustin shrugged. “Kids are just...like that. But come on, Mike, we both know there are some weird things out there that could easily be called monsters.”

Mike shook his head. “No, _you_ are the one who _believes_ that. The only monsters that exist are the ones between the pages of Will and my comics.”

Dustin shrugged. “Deny it all you want, Mike. Will’s not here, and she’s the only explanation we have.”

“I’m going to go look in the woods,” Mike groused, unwilling to buy into Dustin’s theory. “Just...stay here and watch her, okay?”

Dustin nodded. “I’m going to use your phone and call off work today,” he decided. “This seems more important. Mr. Clark can sub for me.”

Mike figured it was probably pretty weird working with a man who used to teach you, but he wouldn’t know. He didn’t care to find out, either, no matter his opinions on the Waffle House he worked at. 

He pushed his way outside, watching the barest suggestions of sunrise over the trees, and scanned the front lawn in a wide circle. Halfway out lay the shotgun the two of them owned for defense and the occasional deer hunt, the latter of which was usually done by Nancy when she came to visit and wanted to make sure her brothers had enough to eat. The fact it was just laying there wasn’t a good sign by any stretch of the imagination, but it also meant that wherever Will was, he didn’t have a weapon with him. 

Mike hoped he wouldn’t need it, but the woods around their house weren’t exactly friendly. Mike picked up the gun just in case and ventured further. 

There were two trails of flattened, dead grass. One was clearly made by Will’s boots, emanating outwards from the house with hurried deliberateness and then to and from the shed in a full sprint, but they stopped not too far past where the gun had dropped. The other set was small and light, rushing towards the house, though clearly not made with shoes. 

Oh, hell. Had Eleven been barefoot? Mike had never thought to check. But considering all she'd been wearing was a bloody hospital gown, probably. 

He kept searching, but Will’s footprints just...vanished. They stopped abruptly in that one spot, and try as he might, Mike couldn’t find anymore. He found blood on dead leaves, probably from Eleven, and more flattened grass made by _something’s_ feet, but no sign of Will.

“You didn’t find anything, did you?” Dustin asked as Mike came back inside with a scowl. “Told you.”

“His footprints just _stop_ in the middle of the yard,” Mike complained. 

Dustin smirked triumphantly. “Told you!” he repeated.

“You are way too happy about Will being gone.” Mike rolled his eyes. “Get anything else out of her?”

“Her name’s Eleven -”

“Yeah, got that part already.”

“-but she likes being called ‘El.’”

“Okay.” Mike nodded slowly. It made more sense than being named after a number. “Anyone we can call?”

He shook his head. “No mom, dad’s a ‘bad man’ so she says.”

“Child protective services?” 

“I suggested it and she got really freaked out, so I think that’s a ‘no’ for now.” Dustin shrugged. “Probably had a terrible experience in the past.”

Mike snorted. “You’re the only teacher that would take that into consideration before calling.”

“Not true, Will would too.” 

Mike nodded, conceding the point. He didn’t really think many more teachers besides those two would even _think_ of calling CPS in the first place; back when Will’s dad was still around, no one really noticed the way that Will was afraid of everything or that something bad might be going on.

He sighed. “Okay. So she’s our problem, for now.”

“She’s not a _problem_ , Michael, she is a _child_.” Dustin looked scandalized. 

“I don’t know how to deal with children, which makes them a problem.”

Mike did not like kids. He was not good with kids. Kids did not like him. There was a reason (many reasons) he worked at Waffle House while his best friend was a teacher.

Even if this kid was impossibly cute with her doe eyes and something about her made Mike feel protective.

Dustin rolled his eyes. “We just need to feed her and keep her from getting hurt. Also probably get her clothes.”

“I don’t have clothes that’d fit her.”

“Not even Will’s old ones?”

“They’re at his mom’s house.”

“So go there.”

“How am I supposed to explain any of this? To Will’s mom, let alone my own?” Mike demanded. “Ugh, fine. I’m going to go to Nancy, she’ll keep her mouth shut.” Probably. Hopefully. If only to avoid stressing out their mother. “I’m sure she has old clothes. Or some of Holly’s.”

Dustin gave him two thumbs up and a toothy smile. “Perfect thinking.”

* * *

Will had woken up in the Waffle House. 

It wasn’t the one Mike worked at, because it looked post-apocalyptic, vines crawling all over it and spores of dust floating in the air. Except it _had_ to be the one Mike worked at, because there was only one Waffle House for about 50 miles, and Will recognized the woods around the building. 

It was twilight out, but it had been twilight for awhile, and seemed like it would continue to be twilight evermore. Time didn’t seem real, and not just in a typical Waffle House sort of way. 

There was a cup of coffee in front of him on the table, and it had the appearance of steaming, but when Will touched the mug, it was just as cold as everything else in this place. He shivered. The mug had been there when he’d come to, but he didn’t know how or why; for as long as he’d been sitting in the booth, the world around him was devoid of life.

Not even the trees and vines seemed to hold a spark.

His corduroy jacket didn’t do much to keep the chill out, but Will found it to be exactly the same temperature outside as it was inside, so he pushed out the door and started walking. 

It was Hawkins, alright - he’d grown up here, knew the town’s landscape like he knew his own birthmarks - and yet somehow, it wasn’t. It was fundamentally incorrect, overgrown and lifeless and with an expansive loneliness that seemed to roll out to the horizon. 

There wasn’t a car (of course), so Will put one foot in front of the other, knowing he’d end up somewhere eventually. He didn’t really bother to think about the path he was taking, just walked, and somehow he wound up in front of his mom’s house.

Except, like the Waffle House, it wasn’t really her house. There was a hole straight through the wall on the front porch and the shutters were drooping, cracked. Those same strange vines were crawling up the walls and through the windows.

It was foreboding, but it was still the house he’d grown up in, and the intrepid adventurer in him spurred him forward. 

The door felt like it’d fall apart in his hands. 

The vines continued inside the house, criss-crossing over the floor, up over a rotten-wood table and a couch that was stained and faded beyond recognition. 

Will shivered. It was much colder than his mother would ever keep the house; Jonathan was always hot, but Joyce was always, always cold.

He was the only one in the house and yet he still felt their proximity. Echoes of them, almost. 

_“Mom, he’s an adult.”_

It was like listening with a pillow over his head, the way he used to when Lonnie would scream, but Will was pretty sure that was Jonathan, muffled as he was. 

_“Will’s missing!”_ That was his mother’s frantic voice. _“Something is wrong, I can feel it.”_

“Mom, I’m right here,” he tried, following the sound of her voice back to the kitchen. It was just as empty as it’d been moments before. “Mom?”

_“I’m going to talk to Hopper.”_

_“Joyce, honey, don’t you think that’s a little rash?”_ There was Mike’s mom, trying to soothe Joyce. Will’s mother’s - girlfriend? Wife? Housemate? Whatever - liked to play the optimist. _“He and Mike are adults, after all. Like Jonathan said.”_

“Mom?” he tried again. “Karen?”

No response. 

“Jonathan?”

 _“Will?”_ The answering voice was muffled and incredulous, but it was Jonathan alright. _“Will?”_

“Yes, it’s me.” Will didn’t get an answer to that. “Jonathan, come _on_.”

 _“Where - you -”_ It was like broken radio transmissions, like Will was just off the right frequency. 

“I dunno,” he replied. “Home. But not.”

He waited for something, anything, in response to that, but he didn’t get it. Whatever connection he’d had to Jonathan, he’d lost. 

Will swore.

Dustin always said Will was psychic, and that cryptids were real, and that parallel universes existed and crossed ours, sometimes. Will liked listening to Dustin talk, and could definitely listen to his crazy theories for hours, but that didn’t mean Will necessarily _believed_ them. He wanted to, as a creative and a dreamer; those ideas made up the basis for the comic books he was making with Mike, so of course they took up space in his brain. 

And apparently outside of it, too, unless this was some sort of hallucination. But Will was pretty sure it was real.

He hoped the little girl was doing okay, that Mike had found her and given her something to eat and made sure she stopped bleeding. He was pretty sure the flower-carnivore-monster-thing had come over to this side with him - no explanation as to why it ran off, only that it did - so she was safe from that, at least.

He, on the other hand, was not safe, because the monster was around here somewhere, and he should probably come up with a plan before it found him.

* * *

“Mike, what the fuck?”

“Nancy, I am begging you to just be cool for once in your life.”

“Hey!”

“I’ll tell you what’s going on later, I swear, I just need Holly’s clothes for now.”

“Am I going to get them back? Because that’s what she wears when she stays over here.”

Mike huffed. “ _Yes_ , you’ll get them back, for God’s sake.”

Nancy was doing her lipstick in the hallway mirror. “Fine, but if I’m late for work I’m going to kill you.”

She was a secretary, so Mike did not understand the rush. Five minutes wouldn’t stop the Post in its tracks. 

“Morning, Mike!” Steve called as he emerged from the kitchen with a shiny tie on, clutching a briefcase. “How’re you?”

“I’m great, Steve,” Mike replied dismissively. “Nancy, come _on_.”

She sighed. “Steve, honey, can you go get the bin of Holly’s clothes for Mike?”

“Why?”

“Fuck if I know.” She shrugged. “He won’t tell me.”

Mike groaned. “I’m kind of in a hurry,” he reminded them. 

“Yeah, well, so are we, champ,” Steve pointed out good-naturedly. Mike attempted to suppress a visible shudder. “But don’t worry, I’ll get it.”

Mike got a plastic bin and a glare from Nancy for his troubles, and he slid back into the front seat of his beater while watching Steve and Nancy step into Steve’s _much_ nicer car. Steve would drop Nancy off at the Post, go work at a desk for eight hours, then clock out and pick Nancy up and come home. Steve Harrington could sleep at 4am, not pour shitty coffee and suffer. Steve Harrington was never at risk of missing the electric bill.

Mike wasn’t bitter, not at all. 

When he got back to his house, there was another car on the dirt driveway, one Mike didn’t recognize. Great. He could also make out some dark shape off to the side of the house, but God only knew what that was. 

Hell, maybe it was Eleven’s monster. 

Mike felt like an intruder as he let himself into his own house, and rather than think too hard about it, he elected to just shout, “Dustin, what the fuck?”

Dustin trotted out of the living room, curls bouncing. “I called in the cavalry,” he explained, looking annoyingly proud of himself. 

“Who the fuck is the cavalry?” Mike demanded, craning his neck to see a tall (embarrassingly handsome) black man in his living room, and next to him -

It was The Doctor. Mike’s Waffle House regular. In his house. Looking at the feral twelve-year-old from Fuck-Knows-Where and kneeling in front of her, carrying on a very easy conversation. 

“C’mon, Wheeler, it hasn’t been that long,” the man teased. 

Mike blinked. “Lucas?”

“Who else?” 

The Doctor turned to face him. “‘Sup, Wheeler?” They inclined their head. 

Mike furrowed his brows. 

“It’s Max Mayfield,” Dustin whispered as he brushed past. 

Oh. Oh holy shit. Max Mayfield, sort of his mortal enemy in high school, annoying as fuck and hot and mouthy and dating his best friend.

“Max,” he croaked. “You look...different.”

Max snorted. “I’m the same as when you saw me a few hours ago, Waffle House.”

Dustin looked at Mike with eyebrows rising into his hairline. Mike shook his head. “No, I mean -”

“I know what you mean, it’s pretty obvious you never recognized me. I transitioned in college.”

“What?”

“I’m genderqueer, dumbass.”

Mike’s head was spinning. “ _What_?”

“It means I’m not a man or a woman. Come on, Wheeler, keep up.” They were giving him shit, pushing him around like they always did, but if he wasn’t crazy, there was an edge of fear in their voice.

He nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, okay.”

Dustin decided to jump in before Mike could make an even bigger fool of himself. “I called Max and Lucas cuz I figured they’d want to help us figure out what happened to Will.”

The four boys had been friends since elementary school, grouping up one by one, and then Max had moved to town their eighth grade year and they’d rounded out the five. But Mike hadn’t really stayed connected to any of them when they’d gone off to college; the only reason he still had Dustin was that Dustin had kept in contact with Will and started working at Hawkins Middle this fall.

If you asked him why, he wouldn’t have been able to tell you, and it’d take some deep introspection he didn’t want to do to figure it out. 

He didn’t want to think about a lot of things, including-especially the fact that the stranger he’d fallen in love with was the girl - or not girl, exactly, he guessed - he’d been so damn jealous of in high school for dating his best friend, even after Max and Lucas broke up sophomore year, even after everything. 

Mike hadn’t wanted to think then, either, to try to figure out who and why he was jealous.

“Look, Dustin said you went to get clothes, are we gonna actually give them to the kid or not?” Max demanded, snapping him back to the present. “She deserves better than a bloody hospital gown, come on.”

“Oh, yeah. Uh. Right.” Mike thrust the plastic bin in their direction. “Take your pick.”

“I’m gonna go check her for injuries in the bathroom,” Max declared. “You three can do the weird Monster Hunting Find Will shit I know you’re dying to, like one of your D&D quests.”

“You were a rogue,” Mike muttered under his breath, because Max had joined said quests by times. 

Dustin clapped his hands. “Okay! So we gotta go search for Will.”

Lucas directed his answer at Mike. “I told him we should go to Hopper -”

“Which I said was _stupid_ because police won’t be helpful where there’s monsters involved -”

“You’re the only one who’s taking this monster thing literally! She’s an abused child, she almost definitely means someone associated with her father.”

“Well, excuse me, Dr. Freud.”

“Freud was a fraud and this is _literally my field of study, Dustin!_ ” Lucas rolled his eyes. “Look, I hate cops -”

“You hate cops? Why?” Mike cut in. 

He got a disbelieving stare from Lucas. “Because I’m _black_?”

“What does - oh.” There had been riots in LA a year ago, and Mike seemed to remember hearing about bad things with racist police officers in Chicago. He hoped Lucas had never had to deal with that, but based on the look he was getting, it seemed unlikely. “You wanted to join the police when you were younger,” Mike mumbled, remembering Lucas’ dream of being a superhero but settling for law enforcement. 

Lucas shrugged. “Cuz I wanted to help people. Now I know who actually does that.” He sighed. “Look, I get it. I don’t trust cops. But this is Hopper, who we’ve known since we were little, and who has a hell of a lot more resources than four college graduates.”

“Three,” Mike corrected, trying not to feel embarrassed. 

Lucas nodded, and to his credit, he didn’t look judgmental. “Three, then, and a twenty-two year old Waffle House employee.” Of course, it sounded even worse when you put it like that. 

Max emerged from the bathroom with a much cleaner Eleven in tow, wearing a blue and green t-shirt dress that Mike remembered buying for Holly for Christmas a couple years back. It didn’t fit her anymore, but it was perfect for Eleven, who was also wearing leggings and white socks. Mike made a note not to return that specific item when he gave Nancy the box back.

“She’s from the Lab at the end of town,” Max began with no preamble, even though Dustin had already figured that one out. Mike wondered when they were going to stop learning the same things over and over. 

“They did experiments on her there,” Max continued. Mike regretted wondering. “She can do - weird sci-fi shit, like a Jedi. Move things with her mind.”

He snorted. “You’re kidding.”

Max shrugged and handed Eleven a shiny circle, which started to float - a quarter, Mike realized - and then hit him square in the forehead. “Ow!” he complained. El giggled.

Max grinned, but sobered up quickly. “Her Papa’s a scientist, and they let something bad out of the lab - she keeps calling it a monster, I don’t know exactly what she means by that - and she says Will saved her from it and got her inside the house, but the monster took him.”

“None of that makes any fucking sense,” Mike complained; at the same time Dustin whooped, “I fucking told you!”

“The Lab you’re talking about belongs to the Department of Energy,” Lucas pointed out. “It’s been abandoned for years, and besides, it’s just electricity and stuff.” Mike realized he hadn’t thought of that when Dustin brought it up.

Max rolled their eyes. “She literally just floated a coin with her _mind_ ,” they pointed out. “I think that means we should at least check it out. And not bring it to Hopper, not before we have anything solid. You know Joyce already called him in a panic.”

“How do you know that?” Mike demanded.

“Dustin said you called Jonathan, but Will wasn’t there,” Max reasoned. “And Jonathan definitely told his mother, and Joyce definitely panicked.”

“For good reason,” Dustin pointed out. “She’s right about something being weird.”

Max rolled their eyes again. It was familiar, even with their cropped red hair that made all the angles of their face different. Mike had earned that look all the time in high school. In his worst moments, he’d thought about kissing their derision off their face, but he was still firmly _not_ attracted to Max, it was just to shut them up.

“We have two priorities right now: protect Eleven, and find Will.” Max held up two fingers for emphasis. “It’s fuck-ass early in the morning -”

“School has already started,” Dustin pointed out.

“I rest my case. It’s fuck-ass early, and I’m running on _maybe_ two hours of sleep, and we definitely can’t leave a twelve-year-old home alone” - Max glared at Mike and he snapped his mouth shut - “so I’ll take first shift here while you three nerds go search the woods for clues. If we find something specific that we can take to Hopper, then that’s what we’ll do.”

“I looked outside already,” Mike groused. 

“Look harder.”

Mike rolled his eyes and shared A Look with Lucas, but the three of them shuffled outside anyhow. 

“It’s good to see you, man,” Lucas said with a smile that seemed fairly genuine. “How’ve you been?”

Mike shrugged. “Y’know.” It was a non-answer, and Lucas was ready to call him on his shit, but he quickly asked, “How about you?”

During one of the rare moments in high school where he didn’t hate Nancy, she’d taught Mike the art of escaping conversations he didn’t want to be a part of. It directly coincided with his sexuality crisis and he had really needed relatives to _stop_ asking him about getting a girlfriend. But the same principle applied here, not wanting Lucas - who’d gone out, left, had his own adventure - to ask and find out what a boring life Mike had. 

“I really like my field,” Lucas offered, pushing aside a branch. “I wasn’t going to come back, but Dustin said he could get me a position as a guidance counselor while Mrs. Mowinski has her maternity leave, so I figured why not? Only been back for a couple weeks.” He cracked his knuckles. “I forgot how...small Hawkins was.”

Mike could never forget. It pressed down on him, constantly. “Well, I’m sure your parents are glad to have you back?” he offered. In spite of everything, he knew Karen had at least appreciated him always being around since his future hadn’t held college. 

Lucas shrugged. “Dad’s happy. Mom thinks I’m wasting my time here, and keeps talking about a better life in the city. But the city’s not that much better, just different, y’know?”

Mike did not, in fact, know, but he wasn’t about to admit that. 

“Erica’s livid, though. She got used to being the center of attention, especially Dad’s. She hates having to share it again.” Lucas chuckled. 

“Guys, we are supposed to be hunting for clues!” Dustin called. “Not having a Mom’s Club meeting.”

Lucas rolled his eyes. “We _are_ hunting for clues, dumbass. Some of us can multitask.” He knocked his shoulder against Mike’s with a crooked smile, and Mike felt his face heat up. “What the fuck is a Mom’s club, anyway?” he muttered. Mike didn’t bother explaining.

Dustin did not seem convinced, staring at them with narrowed eyes. “Okay, well, try harder. I found something.” He pointed at the tree next to him. “Claw marks.”

Mike had no idea what kind of animal could do _that_ to a tree and he was pretty sure he never wanted to find out. Lucas whistled.

Dustin was unnecessarily proud of himself. “Told you. Monster.”

Mike did not consider this to be damning evidence, but it was something he couldn’t ignore. “Okay, but how does this help us find Will?”

“There’s blood on the leaves.” Dustin pointed downwards. “If we follow it, we might find something.”

“It’s Eleven’s blood, not Will’s,” Mike pointed out. He was pretty sure, anyway, considering Will’s footsteps had never even made it out this far.

Dustin rolled his eyes again, like Mike was really not getting something important. “Yes. But these two things are _intimately_ connected.”

“Weird use of the word intimate, man,” Lucas scolded. “Also, how do you know?”

“Weird lab girl, Monster, Will goes missing in the span of a few hours? That’s not a coincidence.”

Mike made a noncommittal grunt. 

“Besides, Will’s psychic, this girl is psychic -”

“She’s not _psychic,_ ” Mike cut in.

“She moved a coin with her fucking mind!”

“That’s telekinesis!” 

“So? Telekinesis is a force inexplicable by current science, which falls under the umbrella of ‘psychic!’”

“Is the difference really that important here?” Lucas demanded. “Y’all are acting like you’re 12 again.”

“Yes,” Mike grumbled. It was his livelihood, after all. Or maybe not livelihood, because creative writing didn’t net him income, but sci-fi storytelling was certainly his niche. 

No one argued the “Will is psychic” point. They might’ve, once, arguing that it was a combination of joking and coincidence, but now…

Now he was missing, and Mike had been hit in the forehead with a floating coin moved by a feral twelve-year-old, and he was a little less skeptical than he’d been 24 hours ago. Sure would be handy to have some psychic powers with them right now, though.

The three of them followed the trail of blood to its origin, a tree root sticking out about a foot above ground from a fallen oak. They could see impact marks, too, two tiny handprints where the girl had hit the dirt, driven in deep as she pushed herself to her feet again with desperate force.

There were footprints behind hers that didn’t look like any mountain lion Mike had ever seen. He did not want to know what they came from, to be quite honest; he would’ve liked to close his eyes and then wake up in the cellar at work because he fell down the stairs and had a fucking weird hallucination or something.

Unfortunately for him, though, this was very real, and Dustin was annoyingly excited about it - “I _told_ you!” - and the trail ended a few feet away with no further sign of Will.

Dustin and Mike stared at it, not sure where to go. In spite of the fact he’d expected a dead end, Mike still felt himself fill with bitterness and frustration. It was only when Lucas placed a hand gently on Mike’s shoulder that he felt himself calm down.

“I don’t think there’s anything more for us out here,” Lucas said gently. “Let’s go back to the house and regroup. Maybe whoever Eleven is running from took Will. Either way, she’s probably our best source of information.”

Mike nodded numbly, still staring at the giant footprints. “Yeah, okay.” He hoped there was something, anything she could tell them. He was starting to get _really_ worried about his friend.


	2. Dude, We're Getting the Band Back Together

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warnings for this Chapter: Referenced Child Abuse/Domestic Violence, mild blood/gore and OC death

Jonathan Byers had expected more from life than this. He’d dreamed of big things, of university in New York that never happened - university never happened at all, actually, because when Jonathan even _tried_ to chase his dream, he hadn’t been able to hack it. It was a better financial decision for him to just work and save for Will’s schooling, anyway; Will had attainable dreams, and Will’s dreams always mattered more. Not to Joyce, Jonathan wasn’t bitter or jealous or anything like that, but to Jonathan himself: he’d spent his whole life putting Will first, and it wasn’t like he was going to stop now.

Which was why Mike’s phone call had freaked him out so much. There had been _no_ information to go by, and now Jonathan was left pacing his kitchen while his mother and Karen Wheeler argued. 

“I’m just saying -” Karen said for the seventh time, which was bound to end like the other six. 

_“Jonathan?”_ The man whipped his head around, looking, but Will was nowhere, even though his voice had been mere feet away. 

Christ, now he was going crazy. According to everyone else, it ran in the family, so whatever. 

Except he heard it again. _“Jonathan?”_

“Where are you?” he asked, loud as he dared, moving his head around. The women didn’t notice him, for which he was grateful. Karen wouldn’t believe him, his mom would, and he honestly didn’t know which was worse.

Of course, he didn’t hear anything else, further supporting the idea he’d gone crazy.

Holly tugged on the sleeve of his sweater. “Jonathan, I have to get to school,” she complained. 

He scooped her up, even though she was inarguably too big for it at this point, and was rewarded with a childish squeal. “Yep. C’mon, I’ll drive you, let’s let our moms keep arguing.”

She let him carry her so far as the front door before she started squirming. “Jona- _than_ ,” she whined. “I’m not a _baby_.”

“Hmm.” He tapped his chin as he set her on her feet. “I dunno. Last I checked, you were my baby sister.”

She blew an annoyed raspberry at him, reminding him very much of Nancy, and snatched up her Lisa Frank backpack. “I’m a _teenager_.”

Jonathan remembered being a teenager. He’d thought he had a lot more figured out back then than he did now. He’d also had a lot bigger dreams; now, he just wanted to make enough at the General Store to keep his family afloat. 

When Karen Wheeler moved in, bringing Holly with her, Jonathan had been worried. They didn’t have enough _room_ for new people. But Holly took Will’s room (which he didn’t mind) and Joyce and Karen shared a bed (which had shocked him but also made him at least a little happy for her), so now the only issue was money. Like it always was. 

He knew they could always ask Steve if they needed anything. Nancy would never let her family go without. But Karen Wheeler was stubborn as hell, and even though Jonathan liked Steve a lot, he wanted to keep a little bit of dignity. 

So he dropped Holly off at the high school and went to his morning shift.

He was opening by himself, which he never minded. He appreciated the solitude, honestly. 

(Haha, how surprising, Jonathan Byers likes being alone.)

It also gave him a chance to use the back telephone without anyone disturbing him. He punched Will’s number and tapped his foot anxiously, listening to each ring with increasing apprehension. 

“Hello?” answered a voice that was neither Mike nor Will. Somehow, though, it still pulled at the edges of his memory. “Who is this?”

“Jonathan. Is Will there?”

The person snorted. “Uh, no. That’s kind of the problem, dude. I can get you Mike, though, if you want to talk to him.”

“Yes, please.” The voice clearly knew him, but he couldn’t place it. 

He heard the rustling of someone covering the receiver, and then, _“MIKE!”_ He winced. Even through the hand, that was loud. “It’s Jonathan!”

More rustling, phone changing hands, and then Mike’s breathless, “Did you find him?”

“No, I was hoping he’d come back.” Jonathan exhaled slowly. “Who was that, anyway?”

“Max Mayfield.”

Jonathan remembered her. She’d been the punky younger sister of Town Menace Billy Hargrove. Last he’d heard, she’d gotten a biology undergrad and was going to med school now. She still lived at home, supposedly, because they didn’t have much money, but he hadn’t seen her since Will’s high school graduation party. “Oh.”

“They’re - We’re looking for Will. Max, me, Dustin, Lucas.” He sighed. “We’ll keep you updated, I know you have a double shift today.”

Mike had once told Nancy (in front of Steve and Karen Wheeler and just about everyone Jonathan loved) that she’d made a mistake and she should’ve married Jonathan instead of Steve. He appreciated Mike’s weird way of showing affection - he actually got on pretty well with the kid at this point - but hearing those words when he’d been stupidly in love with Nancy Wheeler for ten years had been one of the most awkward moments of his life.

“Yeah, okay.” He sighed. “Mom’s going to Hopper, just so you know, but I don’t think he’ll do anything.”

Mike made an affirmative noise. “Look, things are...weird,” he said finally. “Can you come by our place after your shift?”

“Sure. Need anything?” Jonathan asked.

“No,” Mike answered too quickly, the same way he always did, because he knew Jonathan was struggling too. It always gave him mixed emotions. “Actually...if you’ve got anything Holly enjoys, that’d be helpful.”

Jonathan blinked, slow and confused. “What?”

There was a crash in the background and several swears. “Shit, gotta go. Bye, Jonathan!” Mike hung up before he could ask for any more clarification.

Somehow, Jonathan felt like he knew even less than before he’d called.

* * *

“So apparently there’s a department meeting I forgot about.”

Max rolled their eyes. Dustin really hadn’t changed at all since they met him. “That seems like an issue,” they snarked. 

“Yeah. I...need to go to that. Mr. Clark said he’d take the rest of my day, but I can’t miss the meeting.” Dustin winced.. “I’m sorry!” 

Mike huffed. “I can’t believe you.”

Lucas was looking sheepish, too, that same annoyingly adorable look Max had always loved back when they dated in high school. In a lot of ways, he hadn’t changed either. “I promised Erica I’d take her out for lunch. To make up for the part where I’m stealing all the attention. Also she wants me to look over her college application essays.”

Mike sighed dramatically. “And I suppose you’re leaving too?”

Fuck it, all three of them were the same. 

“I’m not. I told you, no class today. Besides, someone needs to supervise you around a child,” Max taunted, reveling in the wrinkling of his nose. Annoying the shit out of Mike Wheeler was a competitive sport, and Max aimed to keep their champion title.

Any excuse to stay out of their house was a good one, in Max’s opinion. Spend as much time away from their step-father as possible. Billy had fucked off as soon as he turned eighteen, hopping in his Camaro and driving back to the West Coast. Max had wanted to leave too, but Max had aspirations of med school that required making deals with the devil so they worked their ass off and they stayed in that fucking house and they took Neil Hargrove’s money and they took the verbal abuse.

On a more visceral level, Max was afraid of what would happen to their mother if they left her alone with Neil. And if he shoved them into a wall every once in a while, well, at least he wasn’t touching Susan.

So maybe this thing with the girl hit closer to home than they cared to admit. If they couldn’t sleep the day away to avoid their step-dad, supporting this girl and helping her get safe seemed an excellent use of their time. 

Maybe it would make them feel a little less helpless. 

Lucas and Dustin left, and the tension ratcheted up to unbearable levels. Mike wouldn’t make eye contact, and it was quite frankly ridiculous. 

Max had been aware of three things in high school: one, Mike Wheeler wanted to sleep with them; two, he was _completely unaware_ of that fact; and three, so long as he perceived Max as a girl, that was never going to happen. 

Lucas had been the only person Max had ever let themself have feelings for, and that had turned out poorly. They still remembered the look on his face when they said, “I can’t be your girlfriend.”

They couldn’t be anybody’s girlfriend, ever, but it had taken them a while to figure that part out, to figure out what felt wrong about an otherwise perfect relationship. 

Things had almost started up again with Lucas twice during undergrad. The spark between the two of them had never really faded, but Max never let anything happen. They couldn’t bear to start a relationship again only to be perceived as a woman they weren’t. Lucas accepted them wholeheartedly, but things were...complicated.

Now here was Mike, pointedly not looking at them, all the jokes from study sessions dried up on his tongue, and Max felt oddly hurt about it. Sad and frustrated. He had probably figured out somewhere along the line the kind of feelings for the “girl” he thought he knew back in high school, and now that he realized Max was - whatever the hell they were - he was disgusted at himself for feeling that way.

Well, screw him. He didn’t have to want to fuck them to treat them like a person.

They tossed a pillow from his couch at him. “Hey, Waffle House, you there?”

His face turned bright red. “Yeah,” he groaned. “What do you want?”

“I didn’t eat breakfast before I came over, wanna make me something?”

They expected him to say no, they really did, but Mike climbed to his feet. “Scrambled eggs and toast?” he asked, but in a tone of voice that said if they refused, they wouldn’t be eating. 

Max, for once in their life, decided not to push it. “Sounds good.” They tilted their chin in Eleven’s direction. “Has the kid eaten?”

Mike nodded. “I fed her when she got here. Though she looks like she’s not usually fed enough, so maybe we should feed her again.”

Eleven sat shoved into the corner of Mike’s couch, knees up to her chest, eyes firmly shut, but Max _knew_ she was aware of every single thing happening around her. Her shoulders were tense with a familiar hypervigilance that made Max’s own body ache in empathy. 

“Probably a good idea.” They stood up. “Hey, El?” Her eyes snapped open and Max realized she might hate that nickname and they should probably check. “...Can I call you El?” They got a slow, wide-eyed nod in return. “Okay, cool. El, do you want some more food?”

El looked at them suspiciously, then Mike, then back to them. Finally, slowly, she nodded again. “Food,” she repeated.

“Great. Follow us to the kitchen,” Max directed. Eleven stood up and trailed after them.

Mike’s kitchen was tiny, and while there were only a few dishes in the sink, the size of the room made everything feel more cluttered. They’d lived in worse places, though. They sat down off to the side at the kitchen table and El stood behind them, pressed into a corner, clearly taking stock of everything around them. 

Mike was still in his work clothes, and his hair was all floppy, and Max had to admit he looked kind of cute as he started cooking. It’s not like they’d never noticed at Waffle House at 3am, it’s just that this was a less reasonable hour to think things like that. He was _Mike Wheeler_.

And they were Max Mayfield, and there was a psychic twelve-year-old behind them, so maybe they could give themself a pass for a one-off weird morning. 

“You should sit, El,” Mike suggested, but the girl glared. “Or...not.”

“She’s doing what makes her feel safe,” Max explained. 

“Standing in a corner?”

They rolled their eyes. “There are only two directions she can be attacked from, and she can see both of them. Her back is completely protected.”

“We’re not going to _attack_ her,” he protested, aghast. 

It would be cute if it didn’t seem so stupid to Max, having grown up like they did. “Yeah, but _she_ doesn’t know that. She said her dad was a bad man.”

Mike shrugged, conceding the point. He may never have known exactly what happened in the Hargrove house, but he knew Lonnie Byers, and he knew how dads can be.

“What did he do to you?” he asked El softly, and Max expected her to glare and keep it to herself, to telegraph that it was none of his business, but they were surprised as she reached out her arm and tapped the tattoo. 

Max had noticed it when they were helping Eleven change - they figured it’d best be them, cuz they were the closest thing there was to another girl - but it still struck them and turned their stomach. “He put that there?” they demanded.

She nodded. Then, because they were looking closer, they noticed a bunch of scarred dots across Eleven’s arm. 

Max was in Med school. They knew what track marks looked like. And they knew a twelve-year-old with a tattoo and a number for a name who grew up in a lab wasn’t using like you’d normally see. Her dad had injected her with something - who knew how many different things - over and over until she had small constellations on her arm. The other one matched.

God, Max was going to find this guy and bash his head into a fucking wall. 

Mike was frying the eggs, so he didn’t see it. Max didn’t know whether that was a good thing or not; they’d have to tell him, but they couldn’t in front of the girl. She was a kid. Even if everyone knew how fucked up her situation was, they owed it to her to at least be polite about it. 

El put her hand on top of Max’s head and rubbed. They had their hair cropped close, like hers, but a bit longer. “Bad man?” El asked softly.

Max didn’t get it until El tapped her own shaved head. “Oh. No, I like having my hair like this.” They tended to keep in like k.d. lang from her Vanity Fair cover - and yes, Max did own a copy of that issue for incredibly embarrassing sentimental reasons - but it’d been getting long and they’d shaved it because they had to do their hair themself and it was easier to do it like this. “Did you not want it?”

El shrugged. Max wondered if she’d ever been allowed to consider her own desires before. She was going to now, if Max had anything to say about it.

Mike slid a plate of steaming eggs and toast in front of Max, and a cup of coffee that they hadn’t even asked for or noticed him making.

“It’s instant,” he said, almost apologetic, “but I figured you might need it based on how much sleep you got.” He raked a hand through his hair. “I sure as hell do.”

“Did _you_ eat something?” they asked. If he was taking care of them, they ought to return the favor. 

He shook his head. “Not hungry,” he said too quickly.

“Liar.”

He glanced away awkwardly. “I can’t eat, okay? If I do, I’ll get sick.”

“Ah. Anxiety.”

“No!” he protested. 

“Calm down, Wheeler.” They rolled their eyes. “It’s a common symptom. And Will’s missing, you’d be ridiculous not to be anxious.”

“Oh.” He hid his face in his coffee cup. “Hey, El, wanna see what I’ve got in the fridge?”

She made him walk in front of her the whole time, which Max watched while they tucked into the plate of eggs - Wheeler was a damn good cook, but they weren’t going to tell him that - and she only stepped forward when the fridge was wide open. She looked amazed, like she’d never seen so much food before. 

Hell, she probably hadn’t.

She reached for - something, Max couldn’t tell what, but her hand stopped suddenly and she started _shaking_ , and the house shook with her. 

“What the fuck?” they demanded. 

Mike hurriedly shoved Eleven back at them, which probably did not help matters, and they caught her as he slammed the fridge shut. “She saw the Coke and she freaked out,” he explained, a note of panicked confusion in his voice. “I don’t -”

Max rubbed her hands comfortingly down Eleven’s arms, making shushing noises. Shockingly enough, it worked, and the room around them began to still. “It’s probably some sort of thing associated with bad stuff they did to her at the lab.”

“Okay.” Mike did a decent job of trying not to look freaked out. “So Coke is bad. Should I just - get rid of it?” He sighed. “Christ, what else is going to scare her?”

That wasn’t a question Max had the answer to, so they just shrugged. Eleven had melted completely into their arms at that point. “Just give her some fruit.”

“I don’t have fruit.”

“How do you not have fruit?”

“I didn’t have time to buy groceries this week, Jesus!” Mike rolled his eyes. “We could always go shopping.” 

“Eleven can’t go out in public,” Max pointed out slowly. Mike did not seem discouraged. “Wheeler, we cannot leave a twelve-yea-old alone in your house, even if she _wasn’t_ psychic and wanted by the government.”

“Fine. _I_ will go shopping.” Mike threw his hands in the air. “Gives me something to do.”

Max rolled their eyes. “Have fun. Try and get some healthy shit.”

Mike gave a fake salute. “You got it, Doc.” And then he left Max alone in his house, to their own devices. He hadn’t even given Eleven anything to eat before he left. 

They grumbled. “C’mon, kiddo, I’ll find you something.”

The fridge was pretty barren. Mike hadn’t been kidding. There was the offending set of Coke cans next to a six-pack of beer from what was empirically the worst brand you could buy, a few tupperware full of leftovers, a suspicious-looking jug of milk, a mostly-empty bottle of “maple syrup,” and some very limp broccoli.

Max rolled their eyes. It really was a bachelor pad. 

They found a bit more in the freezer, including a gallon of ice cream, but they figured starting Eleven on an “ice cream for breakfast” kick was probably a bad idea in the long run. Eggos were undeniably a morning food, though. Max was pretty sure these belonged to Will - something about it said “quick teacher breakfast” - so they thanked him, wherever the hell he was, and they toasted a couple Eggos.

Eleven sat very primly at the table, with impossibly good posture for a twelve-year-old. Max’s heart flipped. They knew a bit too much about all that. Will didn’t talk about Lonnie much (or ever), but when he did, he went to Max.

Jesus, how had Wheeler been so oblivious?

The answer was, of course, that he was Mike Wheeler, and that Nancy had gotten all the powers of observation in that family. 

While Max doubted the integrity of the “maple syrup” in the fridge, this was a child, so they dumped it on the Eggos, praying that some tree somewhere had been part of the process of its making. They also attempted to pour a glass of milk, for strong and healthy bones, but they’d been right to be suspicious of the milk, so with a wince, they poured _that_ down the drain and gave El more water.

Eleven did not wait for Max to hand her a fork, just picked up the sticky Eggo with both hands and took a massive bite out of it. She chewed slowly, considering, and then looked at Max with big eyes and said, “Good.”

Max couldn’t help but laugh. “I’m glad,” they replied, sliding the fork back into the drawer. 

The girl practically inhaled the Eggos, making Max wonder what they’d been feeding her. Not enough, for sure: they could see the sharp outlines of her wrists and collarbones jutting under her skin. 

“What’s your favorite food?” Max asked, curious. All children had one, in their experience.

El pondered this question seriously, then raised the tiny sliver of waffle she had left.

“Eggos?”

“Egg-go.” Eleven over-pronounced the word, rolling it around on her tongue. She nodded. “Yes.”

Max hoped it was because the Eggos were so good and not that El never had other food. 

When El finished, Max took her plate and washed it, feeling a pair of curious eyes studying closely. Mike had some other dishes in the sink, and Max absently began doing those, too.

“Can you dry these?” they asked, wanting to make sure Eleven felt useful. The girl cocked her head, so Max grabbed a towel and showed her. “See? No water.”

El nodded sharply. “No water,” she repeated.

Max washed and El dried and they made their way through the mess of coffee mugs and last night’s dinner until the sink was empty and Max felt emotionally satisfied. 

“Thank you for your help,” they said. El stared. “Thank you? It’s what you say when someone does something that makes you happy.”

“I know.” A long, steady pause. “Why?”

“Why what?”

“Why happy?”

Max thought it over for a second. “You didn’t have to help me, but you chose to. It made my life easier, and it made me happy.”

El made a noise in the back of her throat. Max hoped it was understanding. 

How else to keep a kid occupied? “You can go turn on the TV,” Max suggested, beginning to sort the dishes into their rightful place. “I’ll join you in a minute.”

It involved lots of opening and closing of cabinets, but eventually, Max managed to put everything back where it belonged. They emerged from the kitchen to see Eleven cross-legged on the floor, jerking her head to the side. Every time she did, the dial turned and a new channel came on, switching through some morning news program, an exercise show, and finally settling on a soap opera.

Max was not a fan of soap operas - too contrived and dramatic - but it seemed polite to let the lab experiment child pick. Her tragic backstory gave her the option to do pretty much anything she wanted, in Max’s opinion. And while she watched, Max thought and planned and attempted to see how El’s tragic backstory could have a happy ending.

* * *

Will had lost track of how long he’d been in this place. Hawkins, but not. He’d wandered every inch of the town he grew up in, taking in the vines and the colors. Sometimes, in the distance, he’d see something run - most of the time it was tall and slimy, resembling the first monster Will had seen, but sometimes it was on all fours, like the world’s most cursed cat.

It was like Hawkins had gotten sick and died. Something had _made_ it sick. If Will tilted his head just right, he could see a shape to the clouds above him, a figure with tendrils streaking outwards. He hoped he was imagining it, but he knew he wasn’t.

This was a horrible situation, and the worst of it was that Will was alone. He wished Dustin was here, because Dustin would undoubtedly be losing it over the scientific implications, doing every bit of investigating he could; his excitement would be infectious, the way it always was, and Will wouldn’t feel tired - god, he was so tired, even though he was only 23 - or alone, or frightened, because Dustin wouldn’t let him. 

Hell, Dustin would probably be upset that Will had been here without him, even though it wasn’t on purpose or anything.

No sooner had he thought about his desire for company did he see something stumbling towards him. Some _one_ , actually, Mr. Larrabee who lived on the edge of town and always liked to go hunting whenever he wanted. He didn’t have his gun right now, but more important, he didn’t have the lower half of his left arm. 

“William? Will Byers?” he demanded, stumbling closer. “Oh, thank goodness, I haven’t been able to find _anyone_ around here.”

Mr. Larrabee had called Will all number of horrible things based on his perceptions of Will’s sexuality, but then, alternate dimensions did do a lot to change one’s perspective, he guessed. 

“This - this _monster_ came at me while I was huntin’,” he gasped out. “It tried to take my deer and I said ‘No Siree,’ but then the thing came after me and it didn’t fall when I shot it - and my arm _hurts_.” 

Will didn’t know what to say or do. Mr. Larrabee was paler than a full moon, with red-black blood all down the side of his body. He was trembling, and his eyes flickering. 

He was going into shock, and he was going to die, Will realized grimly. 

Will had already examined Hawkins General Hospital, which looked more like a greenhouse than a hospital, and the General Store, and nowhere were there medical supplies for him to use. He’d resigned himself to not getting injured, but he hadn’t anticipated...this.

“William, you’ve got to help me,” Mr. Larrabee gasped out, and then he gasped no more. 

_Fuck._ Will felt like he was going to be sick. He also came to the horrifying realization that even if he didn’t die here because of the monsters, like Mr. Larrabee, he hadn’t found any medical supplies or food, and all the water was bracken-ish, tainted. His own organic body would give out, because there was nothing here to sustain it. 

He knew intuitively that that was the point of this place. It was supposed to take, to suck and to drain, until _it_ was the only thing left alive. The monsters were just a part of the disease, really, attack cells the parasite sent out to spread and feed. They were like mosquitos.

Big, toothy, faceless mosquitos. 

Somehow, he’d ended up back at the Waffle House. His feet seemed to keep drawing him back there. He had to get away from the body, both because he didn’t want to see it and because he knew the monsters would be coming for it soon, but he hadn’t really had a destination in mind. So here he was. 

There were people inside the Waffle House, now, people Will realized he recognized, flickering on the edges of reality like they didn’t quite exist. A flash of dark hair that looked like Mike - but then, maybe that was simply because of the location. But, unmistakably, there were thick-rimmed glasses and a shock of red hair Will hadn’t seen in twelve years, and when she turned and stared right at him with a feral smile, he knew Barb Holland. 

Except just like the rest of Hawkins, she felt...wrong. She wasn’t Barb. 

She beckoned him inside. On the one hand, he _really_ didn’t want to go, but on the other, maybe she would have some answers about this place.

She was sitting on the other side of the booth he’d woken up in. His coffee was still there, untouched; still steaming, still cold. He slid in across from her and regarded her warily. “Hello.”

“Hi, Will.” And God, wasn’t it weird to see a fourteen-year-old girl in front of him, the girl who never got to grow up, the girl almost as young as some of the kids he taught, the girl who used to be older than him, once upon a time. 

As if hearing his internal monologue, she frowned. “Oh, I’m sorry, is my appearance unsettling? How about this?” And then she...shifted, sort of like the way a TV flickers but _wet_ , sliding, like reality didn’t quite want to hold her. 

When she finished, he was looking at Barb as she could’ve been, all grown up. She was in a purple dress that Will recognized; it was the one Nancy’s bridesmaids had worn. “Is this better?” she asked through a smile that felt like a threat. “Seeing how it could have been, if only you’d told someone? You could have saved her, you know.”

_Her_.

“Yes, her. Not me - I’ve always been beyond saving. We all are, here; that’s the point.” 

Through the kitchen window, Will caught a glimpse of who was definitely Mike, but only Mike in the same way that this was Barb. Not-Mike and Not-Barb.

“Where is here, exactly?” he asked slowly. 

Not-Barb tilted her head. “Hawkins, of course. The town you were born and will die in. Though,” she laughed, “I suppose you were born on the other side.”

“I don’t understand.”

“You know that cute little board you and your friends used to play D&D with?”

Of course Will knew. The real question was how Not-Barb knew.

“Oh, Will, I know everything you know,” she laughed, and it sounded like grating metal. “So the board. What’s on the other side of the board?”

“Nothing,” Will replied, but she shook her head, clucking disappointedly. 

“Not nothing,” she replied. “ _Darkness_. It’s still the board. You just flipped it upside down, so it looks different. Darker.”

“So you’re saying this place is Hawkins, but Upside Down?” he asked.

She shrugged. “In a sense. All the elements are still here, things just...look a little different.” She laughed. “Well, not _all_ the elements. That’s what makes you special; that’s why It likes you.”

Will felt a chill. “What likes me?”

“It.” She pointed upwards. “The creature that made this place Hawkins, but darker. It likes you because there’s only one of you, and It wants to keep you on this side, to play with.” She tilted her head, pensively. “There was a little girl, too, who didn’t exist here, and It wanted to keep her here, too, but she ran away. You wouldn’t happen to know anything about _that_ , would you?” Not-Barb asked with false cheer, a question they both already knew the answer to.

“Of course he knows.” Not-Mike swept out of the kitchen with two plates in hand. “Because he had to go disappear and leave me alone with a kid. Or...the other guy, I guess.” He looked at Not-Barb. “How do you keep you two straight?”

“Cuz she’s been dead twelve years and I’m still here.” She was back to looking fourteen, and Will saw a flash of braces. “You’ll get there, Mikey.”

Not-Mike made a face. He put the two plates in front of them, and whatever it was, Will did _not_ think it was edible. Regardless, Not-Barb stabbed it with a fork he would swear hadn’t been there a second ago and put a gelatinous blob in her mouth. 

“Delicious as always.” 

“Yeah, yeah.” Not-Mike rolled his eyes. “So have you explained to him that he lives here now?”

“I was _getting_ there.”

“You’re not actually older than me, don’t give me that voice.” He looked back over at Will. “Hi. Welcome. You’re here forever, or until It gets bored of you, but my money’s on forever. I know it sucks, because this whole place sucks, and because I know the other one of me is really freaking out about you, but it’s not like there’s anything you can do, so you may as well get used to it.” He pointed to the plate of what was arguably food. “You should eat.”

“I’d rather not,” Will replied carefully. Unbidden, the Greek myth of Hades and Persephone came to mind, and the pomegranate seeds that led to eternal entrapment.

Not-Mike shrugged. “Suit yourself, but you’re gonna start feeling hungry soon. It’s not like it tastes good, but it keeps you going.”

“What if I starve myself to death?” Will asked, more out of curiosity than an actual plan. “So I don’t have to stay here.”

“You can’t die here,” Not-Mike replied. He sounded permanently exhausted. “You’ll just...become like us.”

“Like you?”

“What’s the difference between me and the Mike that you know?” Not-Mike asked.

On a bad day, nothing. On a good day...there were smiles, and jokes, and even though he was always tired, there was still this spark of life Mike had. 

If Will didn’t make it back, every day was going to be a bad day for Mike. God, he had to. 

“If I could feel admiration, I’d probably admire your loyalty, but it’s no use, man.” Not-Mike shrugged. “There’s no way out of here. You either stay yourself or become a…”

Will didn’t get to find out what he would become, because Not-Mike and Not-Barb dissolved in front of him, like someone had flicked the off-switch for a projector. 

He supposed naming conventions were probably up to him, then. Well, Not-Barb had said this place was like the D&D board but Upside Down. That seemed as good a name as any. And these - people seemed too strong of a word for them...they were shadows, really, Shades of who they were on the other side. 

When he realized he’d absently brought the cold coffee cup to his lips, he dropped it with a start. It shattered, but the liquid didn’t splatter. It oozed. 

Will was really glad he hadn’t taken a sip.

* * *

Mike only had to work until midnight tonight, which was good, because if he counted properly, he’d been awake for approximately thirty-eight hours by now. So had Max, if not more, but they seemed a hell of a lot more okay with it.

“You’re coming?” he asked, disbelieving. 

“Well, yeah. Weird kid or no, I still need to study,” Max explained, rolling their eyes. “And the Waffle House is the best place to study.”

Out of nowhere, Mike realized he wanted that to be because of him. Oh, fuck, his stupid crush on the Doctor hadn’t gone away even though now he knew they were Max. Great. 

“Don’t worry about us, we’ve got everything under control,” Lucas promised. “I’ll make enough dinner for you two to have some when you get back.”

Max shot him an appreciative grin, which he returned twofold, and fuck, Lucas was pretty. 

Mike triple checked that he was locking the door, feeling paranoid, though he wouldn’t say for no reason. Lucas and Dustin had strict instructions not to leave; Will’s keys were on him, and Mike needed his set, so they were fucked if they got locked out.

More importantly, Max pointed out, the safest place for a girl on the run from “bad men” was inside that house, and it was up to Lucas and Dustin to protect her.

“We should go together,” Mike suggested, finally satisfied with the door. “Since we’re both going and then coming back here.” Or at least he hoped they were. He figured that was the best plan considering they still knew fuck all about what was happening.

Max nodded. “Agreed.” They still made their way over to the dark shape by the side of his house, which turned out to be their motorcycle. “Hop on, Wheeler. Only got one helmet, though, so you take it.” They tossed the motorcycle helmet at him and he caught it, barely. 

He gaped. 

“You’re gonna catch flies like that,” they teased, swinging a leg over the bike. “C’mon, you’re gonna be late for your shift.”

That, more than anything else, spurred him forward, awkwardly climbing on the bike and wrapping his arms around Max’s middle. They didn’t move until he had the helmet on, but when he did, they tore off with a jubilant shriek. 

This was the perfect mix of exhilarating and terrifying that made Mike’s heart beat double time, pressed into Max’s back and feeling the wind whip by on both sides. This was crazy. This was _so_ crazy. But it wasn’t like he’d never imagined it, watching them get on their bike in the mornings. 

It was, though he was loath to admit it, even better than he could have imagined. 

He didn’t think he’d ever made it to work that quickly. Max slid off the bike easily, a stark contrast to his complete lack of grace, and as they caught the helmet and lifted it off his head, he was absolutely dazzled by their smile. 

It was all adventure and wildness, promising a life of _more_ than what he had currently. 

They fished a book out of some cranny Mike couldn’t detect and nodded towards the diner. “Shall we?”

He nodded, heart still in his throat, even with his feet solidly on the ground again. Normally, he’d go in through the back and clock in, but he didn’t want to stop walking beside Max, so he didn’t. They slid into the same table they always sat at and looked up at him as they cracked the book open. “Coffee?” they asked. 

He nodded again. Why was he speechless? What the fuck was wrong with him? But he hurried to the back to punch in and grabbed a pot of coffee and tried to shove those questions out of his mind. 

It wasn’t too long a shift, but Max still went through a ridiculous amount of coffee. Mike was getting to the point where he could tell when they needed a refill just by the expression on their face. 

“Now that’s what I call exceptional service,” Max teased.

He flushed. 

He bade Jimmy the cook goodbye and counted out his register, hurrying as he felt Max’s eyes burning into him through the glass window. He hated to keep them waiting. But when he got on the bike, helmet on again, they started driving in the opposite direction from his place.

“Where are we going?” he demanded. 

They shrugged, and it took his body with them because of the proximity. “Figured it was a good idea to check things out, since we were already out this way.”

It didn’t take too long to figure out what that meant as he recognized a large government building coming up on the street. It did look abandoned, but on closer inspection, intentionally so. Parts of the chain link fence were cut and falling down, and the rusted sign that claimed it was an “electric fence” seemed to be lying. 

“We should go inside tomorrow. During the day. Lucas won’t have to be with Erica, so he can come with us too.” Max chewed their lip. “Shit, who’ll watch Eleven?”

“We could leave her with my mom and Joyce,” Mike suggested. Max raised their eyebrows. “What? She’s almost Holly’s age, they could have fun together, and my mom’s raised three kids, she knows what she’s doing.”

“You trust her?” Max asked, and somehow the question meant more than just the words. Trust her not to freak, trust her to protect, trust her to keep secrets, trust her to help.

Back when he was in high school, Mike probably would’ve said no. But Karen Wheeler had changed. 

“Yes,” he decided. “Completely.”

“Then Karen Wheeler it is.”


	3. This Shit  Runs Deep

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warnings for this chapter include: Discussions of systemic racism and police brutality, references to medical abuse, references to sexual assault, mentions of suicide (that we all know wasn't really a suicide at all)

Eleven had slept in Will’s room, Max had taken the couch, Lucas got the air mattress, and Dustin slept on the floor. 

“It’s just like camping!” he had gladly exclaimed. He’d been less enthused when he woke up groggy and had to go to one of his mother’s next-town-over educational events, but his blanket nest couldn’t have been too uncomfortable. He’d wanted to beg off, but Max reminded him smugly that a promise was a promise, and Lucas more importantly pointed out that a sad Claudia Henderson was something no one wanted.

Mike, Lucas, and Max piled into Lucas’ car after a very short argument about who would be driving. Lucas made the very good point that Mike’s car looked like it would fall apart at any moment, and that it was more sensible for all of them to travel together and not on the motorcycle, which meant he won the argument. 

Mike took shotgun and looked very gloomy. Max sat in the back seat and taught Eleven how a seatbelt worked, then started kicking the back of Mike’s seat.

“What are you, five?” he demanded, but he just got an impish smile in return. 

Lucas checked his mirrors. “Max, please stop harassing Mike, it is too early in the morning for me to deal with your bickering.”

“Sorry,” Max said, though they weren’t, and they were sure everyone could tell. Eleven managed a smile, and that was what counted. 

There was a mess of cars outside the Byers’ place, one of which belonged to the Chief. Lucas didn’t seem excited, but Max could read the calculating look in his eyes. They’d put money on Hopper coming with them to investigate.

The door wasn’t locked. Max wondered if it ever was; their family always locked the door, because back West you couldn’t just leave it open, but this was Hawkins. Mike pushed his way in first, then Lucas, and Max kept a steadying hand on Eleven’s shoulder as she followed behind. 

“Mom!” Mike shouted.

“ _Jesus,_ Michael,” snapped Karen Wheeler, who had been approximately two feet away. “Use your inside voice, Jonathan is still sleeping.”

Joyce and Hopper stood in the living room, presumably arguing. Hopper was standing stiff and straight, arms crossed, and Joyce was shouting, all motion. Max really admired Joyce’s persistence. At Mike’s shout, though, she snapped around. 

“Did you find him?” she demanded. “Did you find my son?”

Mike looked incredibly guilty and tongue-tied, so Lucas stepped in. “Not yet, Mrs. Byers,” he said with a reassuring smile. He used to give Max that one all the time. “But we’ve got some idea where he might be, and we’re going to check it out today.”

“Who’s this?” Karen asked, pointing at Eleven. “Michael, did you steal a child?”

“Mom, what the hell?” Mike demanded.

“Language!” she snapped. 

Max took this one. “Look, it’s gonna sound crazy, but bear with us here. She’s an abused runaway, and she was the last person who saw Will. We think the people who hurt her have to do with his disappearance, so we’re trying to keep her safe, but we need to investigate today. Mike said you would be a good choice to watch her.”

Hopper looked about ready to say something, but Karen nodded sharply. “Of course we can.” Joyce elbowed Hopper, whispering something in his ear, and then nodded her agreement. She took a small step closer and bent down to get on Eleven’s level. “What’s your name, sweetie?”

Eleven regarded her warily, then tapped the tattoo on her arm. Karen’s lips twisted into a frown that put a sharp crease between her eyebrows, likely experiencing the same emotions Max had at seeing a kid with a number tattoo.

“Her name’s Eleven - I know,” Max added when Karen looked poised to interrupt, “I know it’s fu - messed up.” They caught themself right before they swore. “But that’s her name. She’s twelve, as best we can tell? Doesn’t talk much. Sweet kid.”

Max decided _not_ to mention the part where she had psychic powers; it’s not like Karen would believe them without evidence. Joyce might, but Karen considered herself a stone-cold realist, from what Dustin had told them. He liked to talk about “The Divorced Mom’s Club,” as he called it (which somehow inexplicably included Hopper as an honorary member), and how happy it made his mom. 

There was the implication that maybe Max should get their mom in on it, but it was always so faint, Max could never quite tell what Dustin thought he knew about Susan and Neil and Max’s household in general.

“Okay.” Karen nodded. “Okay.” Then she got that determined mom look on her face. “Have you eaten breakfast, sweetheart?”

Eleven shook her head. Karen turned a glare on Mike, who held up his hands defensively and protested, “She didn’t want to! I tried!”

“She likes Eggos,” Max suggested. Mike had run out, so they hadn’t been able to use that trick, but Max figured it was as good as they could get. 

Karen winced. “Eggos are not healthy for a growing little girl,” she muttered under her breath, but she still had a pack in the freezer, likely Jonathan or Joyce’s choice. “Okay, I’ll make her breakfast. You three -”

Holly emerged from her bedroom with a yawn, still wearing a pair of cheetah print pajama pants. She took one look and El’s blue dress and said, “Hey, that’s mine!”

Karen did a double take. Clearly she hadn’t noticed. She did, however, recover very quickly. “Yes, honey, but El needed some clean clothes, so we let her borrow yours. She’s going to be staying with us a little while, alright?”

Holly squinted suspiciously. El regarded her with an equally wary glance. 

“Where are your parents?” Holly asked. 

Max winced. Ah, the tact of youth.

El shrugged, seemingly not too bothered by it. “Papa. Bad man.”

Holly nodded very sagely. “Yeah, my dad’s a bad man too.”

The statement led to some ensuing pandemonium which included Mike high-fiving his younger sister, Karen chastising her embarrassedly, and El getting very, very confused. 

“Mike,” El began very slowly. “What the hell?”

Max couldn’t help it, they started cracking up again. 

Mike shook his head. “This is my sister, Holly.” 

El nodded. “I have sister, too. But big.” That was new information; Max would have to ask later. Next, she pointed to Karen. “What the hell?” she asked again. 

God, they were going to have to teach her a different way to ask questions, but this was too fucking funny.

“That’s my mom,” Mike explained. “She’s going to take care of you today while we go look for Will, alright?” 

Eleven considered this carefully, but ultimately decided it was in fact alright. 

“Mom?” she asked, pointing at Joyce.

Mike nodded. “Yeah, that’s Will’s mom.”

He was smiling. It was the first time Max had seen him smile since Will disappeared, and they couldn’t help but admit that it was beautiful. 

Oh goddammit, they did _not_ have feelings for Wheeler.

Max had only ever been in love with one person, and that was Lucas Sinclair. They weren’t naive enough to think he was the be-all, end-all of their existence, but no one they’d interacted with in the last six years made their heart flip like he did. 

They’d always figured that, if they were going to find love, it’d be with a lesbian or bi girl, maybe a drag queen. Not their straight ex-boyfriend that they were still stupid in love with. 

And definitely _not_ his even straight-er best friend.

Eleven had decided all was well - she had markedly _not_ asked about the Chief, which Max found endlessly hilarious - and was seated at the kitchen table with Holly, eating a nice Eggo breakfast and listening to the girl chatter. Somehow, Jonathan had slept through all of this. 

“Okay, well. We’re gonna head out.” Mike gave everyone an awkward wave. “We’ll be back when we’re done.”

Hopper cleared his throat. “I’m coming with you.”

“I’m sorry, what?” Max raised an eyebrow. It’s not that they hadn’t anticipated it, but still. “Why?”

“Joyce asked me to find her boy” - he gave her a significant look and oh, Max knew what that one meant - “so I’m going to find him. If that’s what you lot are also doing, then it makes sense we stick together.”

Lucas stuck out his hand. “Welcome aboard, Chief.” He got a firm handshake for his troubles. 

Max, on the other hand, was clearly not convinced, so Hopper looked them dead in the eye and said, “I have a gun,” and that was what convinced them he’d be useful. 

It was easy to be suspicious of adult men. They had never met a good one, and they didn’t imagine they were going to randomly find one in the damn Chief of Police, even if this was Hawkins, not Chicago. But a gun in this situation seemed handy, so they shrugged their acquiescence and bade the household goodbye. 

Hopper had demanded Wheeler come with him for whatever reason, so it was just Max and Lucas this time, and they sat up front. 

“Not how I expected this week to go,” Lucas muttered, shaking his head. He glanced sidelong at Max. “Not how I expected to see you again.”

“You thought you’d see me again?” they asked. 

He grinned flirtatiously. “I couldn’t stay away.”

“Stalker.” They snorted and willed their heart to stop beating double time. They’d never stopped loving him, even for a minute, but they had meant what they said all those years ago. They couldn’t be his girlfriend. And no matter how much he tried, they wouldn’t. 

Lucas shrugged. “It’s been awhile. How's the first semester of med school?” And just like that, back to small talk. He never pushed it, never made them uncomfortable. 

Fuck, he was annoyingly perfect.

“It’s good. I’m learning a lot.” They looked over at him. “Couldn’t find a job in Chicago?”

When Max had been planning to go to IU Med in the fall, Lucas had talked about sticking around. They had been more than a little heartbroken, but at the same time, it was for the best. They sure as hell weren’t getting over him while he was right there in front of them.

And yet here he was again, smiling that same stupid perfect smile he always did, and Max was no closer to over him than before. 

Gross. Will was missing and there was a random psychic teenager, now was _not_ the time to have a romantic crisis. Max was chill. They could do this. 

“Not yet,” Lucas replied. “Tough crowd. When Dustin said he had something, it was a miracle. Plus I missed you,” he offered hopefully.

They couldn’t say they missed him too, but their flaming cheeks probably gave them away. Max flipped on the radio, and _Hey Jealousy_ was playing, so they started to hum along and stare pointedly out the window, ending the conversation. 

_‘All I really want’s to be with you, feeling like I matter too.’_

“Cool,” they heard him mutter under his breath, though they were probably not supposed to. “Good talk, good talk. _Fuck_ , Sinclair.”

That, more than anything, was what got Max. God. They had to cut him loose, they had to tell him it was never going to happen…

But they couldn’t. They’d never been able to, and it’s not like they’d developed a sense of self preservation in the last few months. 

_‘If I hadn’t blown the whole thing years ago, I might be here with you.’_

Lucas had to get out of the car to push the gate arm upwards, but it didn’t fall. The guard station looked decrepit, with dead leaves blowing around on the desk inside. No one had been here in a long time - or at least they were trying to make it look that way. Max was pretty sure they could see some lights on inside the building, but they couldn’t be sure until Lucas parked in front of what appeared to be a main entry. 

Now all that was left was to wait for Mike and the Chief.

* * *

When they’d split into teams, Max had picked Mike and nearly _run_ as fast as they could, leaving Lucas with Hopper. He sighed and told himself that it didn’t bother him, but he’d never been very good at lying to himself.

“Guess it’s you and me, kid,” Hopper intoned, trying for something cheery. Nothing about this building - hell, this _situation_ \- was cheery, though. 

Max and Mike had snuck around to find a back way in and do some snooping. Lucas and Hopper, being the more presentable of the two - a sentence which had made Lucas snort but not disagree - would go in through the front and see if they could find any people to interrogate. If anyone asked, Lucas was on a ride-along with Hopper, finishing up his time in the police academy. 

The lady at the front desk did not ask, simply said, “I’m sorry, you must be lost.” 

“Yeah, uh. This is the Department of Energy, isn’t it?” Hopper’s tone was all business. “I’m looking for whatever scientist is in charge here. Got some questions about some...odd things happening in town.”

Lucas winced. If Hopper was about to mention El, he was pretty sure he’d have to square off with the man. Lucas was not a fighter by any means - even when he was younger, he’d preferred his wrist rocket to fists - but if he had to protect the kid, he would do what he had to. 

The woman’s spine tensed. “Odd things?” she repeated. Her hand was twitching towards something below her desk. Lucas did not like that.

“Yeah, the lights have been acting up all over town,” Hopper continued, and the woman relaxed. “It’s interfering with our traffic lights.”

Shit. Lucas hadn’t even thought of that. Lucky there hadn’t been any traffic accidents with those weird outages.

The receptionist smiled sweetly. “I’m sorry, sirs, you’re not in the right place. This lab closed down about twelve years ago, and we’ve never been in charge of Hawkins’ electric grid.”

“I told you,” Lucas cut in, structuring his next response carefully. “It’s the Department of Energy. It used to be a research lab.” The woman nodded. “Government projects.” She tensed. “Finding new energy sources and stuff.” Relaxed.

“Well, I’d still like to talk to the scientist in charge of this place. Doctor...Doctor...Oh, blast, what was his name?” Hopper muttered, scratching his beard.

“I told you, the lab closed twelve years ago,” she repeated, sounding put-upon. “Dr. Brenner no longer works here, it’s just a few offices.”

“Is there anyone we would be able to speak with?'” Hopper asked. “I just have a couple questions about what you’re doing here.”

She sighed heavily through her nose and prepared another refusal, but just then, a white man emerged, with a shock of white hair and wrinkles that looked like they were formed by a distinctly unpleasant smile. 

“Norma, what’s this?” he asked.

She looked terrified for a second. “Dr. Brenner, I -” To be caught in a lie, then.

“Chief Hopper.” Hopper took a step forward, sticking his hand out imposingly. The two men sized each other up. “Hawkins PD. I just have a few questions about what you do here.”

For a long moment, Lucas thought Brenner would refuse, but the man smiled (unpleasantly) and said, “Of course. Follow me to my office.”

It was a small, cluttered place, with dark walls and papers on every surface. There were no photos, or anything to hint it was used regularly, but the disordered abandon seemed contrived to Lucas. 

The man gave a small chuckle. “You know, you two are rather lucky - I only come in once every few months since they moved the lab. The office still has some use for me, of course.” He patted his desk. “But it’s mostly nostalgia.”

Hopper grunted. “So, I know your receptionist said you don’t have anything to do with the grid, but I’m sure something powers your experiments. Any chance you could be pullin’ the kind of power to cause these blackouts?”

“I’m sure Norma told you, we don’t work here anymore.” Brenner smiled placidly. Lucas found it unsettling. “It’s just offices. So unfortunately, no, I’m not the solution to your mystery.”

“What kind of work did you do?” Hopper asked, leaning back in his chair.

“That’s -”

“-Classified, I know, I know.” Hopper shook his head with a wry smile. “I served in Vietnam, I know how these government things go.”

“That must have been hard on your family,” Brenner said with false sympathy. 

Hopper’s jaw tightened. “Made my family very proud.”

Lucas had strong opinions on the Vietnam War, but now was neither the time nor place to bring them up. 

“Were you married at the time? Children?” Brenner asked with false curiosity. “I was excused from the draft because of my role in the government, but I know it tore so many families apart.”

He was digging at Hopper, that much Lucas could tell. What he didn’t know was _why_.

“No, sir, not at the time.” Hopper inclined his head. “What about you? A wife or kids?”

Brenner’s smile didn’t slip. “A daughter. Twelve years old. You know how girls can be at that age,” he laughed. “She always wants to know what I’m working on. Never takes ‘no’ for an answer,” he finished pointedly.

“What’s her name?” Lucas asked. 

“Jane.” He didn’t even slip, but Lucas had a sinking feeling that _this_ was the bad man. 

He smiled. “That’s pretty. Do you have a picture?”

Brenner frowned sadly. “I’m afraid I don’t.” What kind of father didn’t keep a picture of his kids in his wallet? “Gentlemen, is there anything I can do for you? As much as I am _enjoying_ our chat, I really do have work to do.”

“Did you have to transition projects after the Cold War ended?” Lucas asked carefully.

Brenner only now seemed to truly register him as a threat. “No,” he replied slowly. “My area of study has remained unaffected all along.” 

Everyone knew “Department of Energy” meant weapons. Now that they were ostensibly at peace, the weaponry _should_ have been different. But it hadn’t changed in twelve years, since they’d moved the lab. The real question was what had happened then.

The glaring answer was that Eleven was born, yet somehow Lucas felt no closer to the truth knowing that.

“Was it stressful to move your workplace at the same time your daughter was born?” Blink and miss it, but Lucas was pretty sure he saw a hint of surprise on Brenner’s features. Or at least he hoped he did. “How did her mother handle it?”

“She died in childbirth,” he said emotionlessly. Lucas gave a bit of a start. “Yes, it was stressful, but nothing I couldn’t handle. Our government is truly great and all.” He clapped his hands once. “Gentlemen, I’ve enjoyed your company, but I’ve already been away too long. Please, do reach out if you find you need something.” He slipped them both austere business cards. “Norma can see you out.”

Norma did see them out, and she didn’t seem to relax until they were out the door. She locked it behind them, as if worried they’d get any ideas.

“Well, that was useful,” Hopper drawled, lighting a cigarette. He leaned against his truck.

Lucas shrugged. “At least we know he’s lying to us. And we actually have a lot of information, based on what he didn’t say.” Hopper gestured for him to continue. “He knows about your past, I think, which means he’s looked you up. He was intentionally pissing you off. Eleven is his daughter, but her mother wasn’t his wife -”

“Hold on, explain that.”

“He had no emotions talking about her -”

“That doesn’t mean anything. Men stay strong in the face of death.”

“Your gender norms are antiquated. Everyone feels things.” Lucas rolled his eyes. Hopper rolled them right back. It was a generational thing, he guessed. “He didn’t have any emotions - except _annoyance_ that I had asked.” Lucas took a deep breath, because what he was about to say was...insane. “I think they do human experimentation. I think Eleven is just one of their subjects.”

Clearly not that insane, though, because Hopper was nodding along like it made all the sense in the world. “Eleventh subject?” he asked. Lucas nodded. “Huh.” He smoked in silence for a few minutes before he said, “When you were a kid, you wanted to be a cop.” 

Lucas was surprised he remembered. “I did, yeah.”

“You did a bang-up job with that interrogation. You’d make an excellent detective.”

Lucas shrugged uncomfortably. “That’s not really the career I’m interested in anymore.”

“What changed?”

Lucas really had started his psych degree with an intention of using it forensically. But he’d decided the counseling route would better serve more people. And of course, “Rodney King.”

“The drunk driver?” asked the Chief, brows knitting in confusion.

Lucas stared him down, steely. “The Police Brutality case.”

Hopper tipped his chin, conceding the point, much to Lucas’ surprise. “Oh, yeah. That was some nasty business.” He shrugged. “I’ve got no idea what goes on in the head of those city cops.”

It wasn’t just in the city, it was the whole damn profession that’d grown out of catching slaves, but Lucas didn’t want to argue the point. “I found a lot of people needed help after that. Someone to listen, someone to tell them where to go. Someone who understood.” He shrugged. “I was good at that. So that’s what I did.”

“Good for you, kid.” And Hopper sounded like he meant it too, not a bit disappointed about Lucas’ change in direction. 

Max and Mike came rushing back, and Lucas’ breath caught the way it always did looking at Max. Jesus.

“Anything to report?” Hopper asked.

“They’ve got a whole lab underground. Even if the rest of it looks abandoned, it’s in the basement.” Mike was wheezing. “They have this - this _thing_ behind some sort of glass wall. I think it’s the monster El keeps talking about. It’s got - these long arms, and long legs, and - its head is...it doesn’t have a face?”

Max was doubled over, wheezing as well. “It has a mouth, though, filled with a _shit ton_ of teeth.” Their face was bright red. “I’m pretty sure it knew we were there. And then this asshole-”

“Hey!” Mike protested.

“Fucking...kicked something or whatever, made a whole bunch of noise, so we had to sprint out of there.”

Hopper was squinting. “A monster? Like from that game you kids used to play? A - a demogorgon, or something?”

Another thing Lucas was surprised he’d remembered. Hopper had never paid much attention to them as kids, so he’d thought - even though the man was close to Joyce, he had no interest in the rest. But apparently he did notice some things.

“It looked nothing like a demogorgon, but good effort, man,” Mike panted. “Yes, a monster like from D&D.” 

Hopper looked at them skeptically. “You’re shitting me.”

Max held up a salute. “Scout’s honor.”

They were never a scout. Lucas snickered.

Hopper looked at Lucas appraisingly. “You did say they could be doing some sort of human experimentation…”

“Was Will anywhere in the lab?” Lucas asked, getting two headshakes. “You’re sure?”

Mike nodded. “They were - there was a ton of electrical equipment, but only one holding cell with anything in it, and it was the monster.”

“The demogorgon,” Hopper clarified. 

“It’s not a - okay, yes, fine, it’s a demogorgon,” Mike groused. “Will’s not there. And it’s a very self-contained lab, there’s nowhere to hide anything.”

“How did you guys even get down there, anyway?” Lucas demanded. Max just gave him a wink that made his heart skip. “Alright, yeah, don’t tell me.” 

They swapped the rest of their information, and it quickly became apparent that whatever was happening in that lab _had_ to be the centerpoint of all the weird stuff, Will and Eleven and the power outages. 

Max grinned. “Time to go to the library, then,” they decided. No one disagreed. “Let’s dig up this man’s secrets.” 

Lucas took point, because apparently he was the only one between the four of them who had any idea how to do historical research. “Chief, Mike, Max, you’re on newspapers,” he directed. “The Times, The Post, all of it. Anything about Hawkins, since the sixties - no, you know what, go back to 1955.”

“1955?” If Hopper’s eyebrows could climb any higher, they’d have left his head completely. 

“Start of the Vietnam War,” Lucas explained. “I’d go back even further in the Cold War, but if it had started any earlier, I don’t think we’d have a twelve-year-old today, so 1955 seems a good place to start.” 

“Why the Cold War?” Mike asked. 

“The strongest external motivation for any sort of US Government sanctioned and funded human rights’ violation would be to beat the Russians.” Lucas cracked his neck. “There’s no way something located in Hawkins, Indiana, was motivated by civil unrest alone, otherwise they would have chosen an urban populace and location, probably Chicago. So it has to be international, and it has to be the Cold War.”

Mike looked at him wide-eyed and Lucas couldn’t help but preen a bit under the attention. He couldn’t help it; he’d always enjoyed impressing Mike.

“The library’s not that big,” Max pointed out, looking less impressed than Mike. Lucas tried not to let that disappoint him. “What’re you gonna do?”

He sighed heavily as he eyed the encyclopedias. He loved history, but he didn’t love this part of it. “I’m going to figure out what evil might’ve given them the inspiration.”

* * *

If there was one thing Nancy hated, it was being kept in the dark. 

It’d been a good 24 hours since Mike disappeared with the spare box of Holly’s clothes and she _still_ had no explanation. Her extra work at the Post didn’t keep her nearly occupied enough to quit obsessing over this mystery, balling her hands into the hem of her skirt below the desk. She was about to go insane, which was somewhat common on a Saturday shift, but for entirely different reasons than usual.

When Steve picked her up from work with the usual kiss and, “How was your day, sweetheart?” - tinged with the same amount of fond discomfort every time - she didn’t have anything to talk about except a demand Steve drive her to Mike’s place. She had a suspicion that her reasoning wasn’t very satisfying for Steve - “I need to know what he’s up to” - but he still did as she asked.

He waited in the car patiently while she banged on Mike’s door. Nobody answered. The car was gone, but Will should’ve been home from school by now; maybe he and Mike had gone to visit their moms?

Nancy slid back into the passenger’s seat. “Can we go see my mom?”

“And Joyce?” Steve confirmed. She nodded. “Sure thing, sweetheart. Want to pick anything up on the way?” 

In spite of the fact they’d been married for a few years, Steve was on a constant crusade to impress Nancy’s mother. Also Joyce, to a lesser extent, who he said was just as much Nancy’s mom. Nancy was _pretty_ sure he didn’t realize what he was saying - Steve was pretty, but not always clever, and very few people outside the family realized that Karen and Joyce were actually _together_.

Nancy was a modern woman. It didn’t bother her at all, though she had been kind of shocked to realize her mother was bisexual. The part she _didn’t_ like was the way that occasionally it was brought up that Jonathan was like her brother, which was incorrect and also gross, and not just because she was pretty sure she was in love with him.

She didn’t really have a problem with him calling Holly his baby sister, but within two weeks of their mothers’… _thing_ starting up, Jonathan and Nancy had agreed that they absolutely did not feel like siblings, they were totally too old to get another sibling their age. And maybe she looked at his mouth a second too long in that conversation, or his cheeks got a bit too red, but no one said anything.

She realized she’d been quiet too long and Steve was still staring at her expectantly. She shrugged. “Your call.”

Steve settled on grocery store flowers, which was his go-to besides bringing something over for dinner, and then they pulled up to the Byers’ place. Nancy recognized Mike’s car, but there was also the Chief’s car, plus one she couldn’t name, and a motorcycle off to the side.

“Your mom throwing a party?” Steve asked, grabbing the roses on his way out of the car.

Nancy had no idea what was going on, and she just felt all the more frustrated. 

Steve caught her hand. “Hey. Deep breath,” he advised. “You’re gonna be inside in three seconds and then you’ll know what’s up.”

He wasn’t always clever, but he did know Nancy, and as much as she didn’t _want_ to calm down, she followed his advice and gave him a thin smile.

Steve Harrington was way too good for her, and he’d never ever recognize it.

Jonathan was the one that answered the door, looking the same mix of awkward and happy to see them as he always did and stepping out onto the porch. Nancy got first hug, something quick and demure, and then Steve was pulling him in and clapping him on the back, roses still in hand. 

“Jonathan! How are ya?” Steve asked, grinning.

Jonathan shrugged wearily. “You know. Worried.”

“Worried?” Nancy demanded. “About what?”

Jonathan peered at her. “Will?” She clearly didn’t comprehend, so he continued. “Will’s missing. Mike didn’t tell you?”

Nancy practically growled. “The asshole doesn’t tell me _anything_.” 

Steve and Jonathan each put a hand on her shoulder at the same time. “Easy, sweetheart,” Steve cautioned, giving Jonathan a smile over her head that made her feel strangely guilty.

“Okay, well. There’s...a lot happening.” Jonathan sighed. “Uh, here, I’ll take you inside.”

The first thing Nancy noticed was the girl that was definitely not Holly wearing Holly’s clothes. First mystery solved, opening up a hell of a lot of other questions. 

Everyone was sitting in the Byers’ living room, Mike sandwiched between - Nancy was pretty sure that was Lucas and Max, though she hadn’t seen either of them in years - with the strange girl in his lap as he absently petted her hair. Dustin was there, but Will wasn’t - because he was missing, Jonathan had said. Will was missing and there was a strange child in this house and her mother was sitting at the table like this wasn’t the fucking weirdest thing in the world.

Well, second weirdest. Or maybe not. This might be weirder than Barb disappearing, because when Barb disappeared, there hadn’t been any new individual to take her place.

“MKUltra,” Lucas was saying. “A CIA program where they ran human experiments. Drugs, pushing the human body past its limits...Brenner was in charge. They were running it out of the DOE, _that’s_ the weapons they were working on.”

“When?” Nancy cut in. Only now did everyone else seem to notice her presence. “When were these experiments?”

“Well, the lab shut down twelve years ago” - The same year Barb disappeared - “so probably a few years leading up to that,” Lucas estimated. “Why?”

It was a deep and hazy memory of a woman with blonde hair and bell-bottoms, a 70s relic at the start of a new decade. “I think...I think I knew someone in that study.” Nancy chewed her lip, wracking her memory. She didn’t like to think about anything earlier than her high school graduation, but this seemed important. “This woman...Barb and I were playing in the park. And she started a conversation with us, said she liked Barb’s glasses, and asked directions to the motel. Said she was here for some scientific experiment or something.” Nancy shook her head. “God, that was...so long ago.”

Max squinted. “Was she pregnant?”

Not as far as Nancy could remember, so she shook her head. Then again, the loose florals were good at disguising. 

“What was her name?” Hopper asked. “We could track her down.”

“Terr - Tara?” Nancy winced. “I don’t think she ever told us her last name.”

Mike slumped, defeated. “So it’s another dead end.”

“Absolutely not.” Nancy did not appreciate her brother’s lack of faith in her. “I’ll find her, don’t worry. But first, I want to know what the hell is going on.”

“Also, I would like a vase,” Steve chimed in, and she realized he was still standing awkwardly behind her holding a bouquet of roses. “Hi Ms. Wheeler, Ms. Byers.”

“Hello, Steve!” Karen smiled warmly, and Nancy rolled her eyes. “I can get you a vase. Are those for us?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Steve Harrington was the kind of man moms loved. There was just something about him. In the early parts of his pre-teen years, he used to be a dick, but then he started dating Nancy. When Barb disappeared, he really stepped up on the whole emotional support aspect. Now he was a generally sweet and well-meaning adult man, with boyish good looks, a charming smile, and no idea what was going on in her head ever.

Not that that bothered Nancy, she reminded herself sternly. Steve was her husband and she loved him, even if he didn’t quite get her.

Steve followed her mother into the kitchen while Nancy took her mom’s spot on the couch. Jonathan stood behind her with his hand hovering over her shoulder, not quite touching. 

Mike told most of the story, with Max cutting in when they felt Mike had missed a particularly important detail, and Lucas when something needed more detail or clarification. Nancy gathered that Dustin had missed out on their adventure today, and that’s why he looked a bit sour. They explained finding Eleven - how uncouth, to name a child a number; it made Nancy boil with rage - and how she came from the lab where Nancy was sure her old acquaintance had gone to. She was about the correct age to be Eleven’s mother, though it could be entirely coincidence. Either way, she was a lead.

Holly had volunteered a couple pieces of information, too, like that Eleven’s dad was a “Bad Man.” Nancy wondered why Holly was involved, but she supposed if Eleven was a pre-teen, it’d be unfair to try to keep Holly out of things. Not to mention impossible: the girl was twice as curious and three times as crafty as Nancy had been at that age, and Nancy had been plenty crafty.

Steve came in not far into the explanation, standing next to Jonathan and putting a hand on his shoulder, then one on Nancy’s. “So we’re trying to find her mom?” he asked at the end.

“Uh...kind of,” Mike said. “We’re trying to find a woman who might be her mom who could be a lead on the lab. And Will.”

“Okay, but, even if this lady _isn’t_ her mom, we’re still going to find El’s family, right?” Steve protested. 

Nancy couldn’t help but smile. Steve had decided he was involved before Nancy even had to drag him into it. She loved when he did that. Then she didn’t have to feel like she was making him do things he didn’t want to. 

“Well, then, Steve and I will go to the motel and I’ll find the woman’s name,” Nancy decided. There was only one place to stay in Hawkins, Indiana, if you came to visit - because _why_ would anyone ever visit Hawkins if they didn’t have to?

Steve nodded. “We’ll let you all know.”

“I’ll come too,” Jonathan volunteered, and Nancy’s heart flipped. 

She always felt most complete with both of them. Which was bad, wrong, not how she was supposed to feel; but she loved being a team, nevertheless, and she could pretend they were just working together on a puzzle, not that she wanted to kiss both of them. 

Jonathan gave Holly a kiss on the forehead, making Nancy swoon. Steve looked at him just as soft.

Nancy was so glad they were friends, finally, growing to get along as they grew up, but that just made it feel like an extra betrayal that she was thinking about how she’d love to see Jonathan as a father. Not instead of Steve, just...in addition to. 

She shook her head, kissed Holly and her mother goodbye, and marched out to Steve’s car, taking the back seat before Jonathan could. He looked surprised, but she just smiled winningly and gestured for him to slide up front.

Steve did not like Jonathan’s music all that much, but Steve was also a sucker, and he almost always let Jonathan pick the radio station. It was little things like that she noticed that made her smile, made her marvel at how far they’d come since fist-fighting in high school. How Steve had grown into something softer, gentler.

He was overflowing with love, now. And she felt guilty that she didn’t love him as much as he loved her - how could she, when she was in love with his best friend, too, and when she’d been having second thoughts about getting married while shopping for a wedding dress? 

He was too good for her. She would never deserve him, and he would never see it. 

When they arrived at the motel, the front desk was staffed by a kid who couldn’t have been more than fourteen. Just barely older than Holly. The girl had her hair done up in two braids, and she looked at Nancy and the boys following behind her as if they were the most interesting thing she’d seen all day. 

They probably were, to be quite honest. 

She popped her sucker out of her mouth. “What can I do for you?” she asked, oddly professional. She eyed them up and down. “Will you be wanting some rooms? Or just one,” she paused, and gave a tiny giggle, but it didn’t seem mean-spirited so Nancy tried not to bristle.

“Actually, I was hoping to check your guestbooks,” Nancy explained with what she hoped was a convincing smile. “I’m looking for someone.”

The girl knit her brows. “I’m not sure I’m allowed to -”

Steve stepped forward, flashing the girl his signature Harrington smile. Kids were definitely his forte, and so was gaining the trust and adoration of anyone he wanted. “It’ll only take a second,” he promised. “My wife here” - and god he loved to say that and point at her, and every time it made her feel a weird mix of love and discomfort - “is looking for the last time her aunt came to visit. She says it was fall of 1980, but I _swear_ it was ‘81.” He winked conspiratorially. “Mind helping us settle a bet?”

The girl shrugged. “1980?” she asked, standing on her tiptoes to pull out a thick binder. 

Steve nodded. “Let’s start chronologically.” 

Nancy seemed to remember it being chilly, with leaves on the ground, so she flipped to September and started scanning. She was a fast reader, thanks to her job and her intense desire to move up in the world, so she made it to the first week of November rather quickly and found an entry for one Terry Ives.

“Told you!” she exclaimed triumphantly, jabbing her finger at the page.

“‘Terry Ives,’” Steve read aloud. “Well, I’ll be. Guess you were, darlin’.” 

He was laying it on just a bit thick. Nancy heard Jonathan holding back a snort behind her.

“Here you go,” Steve said, sliding the girl a dollar. “For your troubles. Even if I was wrong.” He looked chagrined, but the girl was too taken with the bill to care.

Nancy marched out of the motel, not waiting to see if they followed. Of course they would. The next stop was the library, to do research, see if they could dig anything out about this woman. In the brief amount of time before the library closed, anyway. It was getting slightly late.

There were heavy clouds in the air, making it darker than it should be, for the hour. It looked like it was going to be a bad storm. 

Nancy didn’t dare ask for the MKUltra articles again, lest the librarian grow suspicious. Instead, she used the oldest ploy she had, one she’d been using for years. 

“I just...I wanted to see if there were any clues that I might’ve missed about Barb’s disappearance,” Nancy told the librarian, who very kindly did not point out that Nancy had gone through the entirety of the 1980-1982 newspaper catalogue at least ten times. Instead, she sighed pityingly and gave Nancy access to what she needed. 

Steve had witnessed this before. She got a little bit manic every anniversary, even though it’d been twelve years now. But he didn’t understand, even after being with her for that long - didn’t understand why she felt personally responsible, and didn’t understand what she hoped to accomplish. 

Jonathan, on the other hand, had not been around to witness this before and seemed rather perturbed. 

“Are you okay?” he asked quietly. 

“For once, yes,” she replied, shooting him an appreciative smile. “She knows I do this, and it’s almost the anniversary. It seemed like a good cover.” Nancy stopped. “Wait. Hold on. Do you think Barb’s disappearance had something to do with the lab and these experiments?”

Everyone had said Barb ran away. There had never been a body, no indication she was in trouble and not just hitchhiking to Chicago. But Nancy _knew_ , because she knew her best friend, and now…

“What if her disappearance was like Will’s?” Nancy wondered, earning a pale understanding look from Jonathan. 

Steve, on the other hand, shook his head. “No, come on. You can’t know that.”

“It’s _obvious_ ,” Nancy snapped.

“It could easily be a coincidence.”

“There is a government conspiracy with _human experimentation_ , a psychic little girl, and the second disappearance in Hawkins since 1923, and you want to talk to me about _coincidences?_ ”

“Easy, Nance.” Jonathan laid a hand on her shoulder. “Easy. He’s not invalidating you” - Steve shot him a grateful smile - “but he is right that we don’t have much evidence. So come on. Let’s find evidence.”

Jonathan went and requested some newspapers from the seventies, checking prior to Barb’s disappearance if there was anything in the news. The librarian raised her eyebrows at him - clearly, his presence with Nancy and Steve had been noticed, and judged. But he talked about how it was for a historical art project that his younger brother Will was looking forward to teaching, you know, Will Byers at Hawkins Middle?

Nancy was impressed by the ease with which the lie slid off his tongue, especially considering Will was currently missing. And maybe a little bit ensnared by it, too. 

She was an investigative journalist, she told herself. She could appreciate a good cover story. And that’s all this was. 

Nancy was elbows deep in 1980 when the librarian came over to the table she sat at with Steve. “The library is closing, Mr. and Mrs. Harrington,” the librarian intoned. It’d been a couple years, but Nancy was still very unused to being called Mrs. Harrington, even by kindly librarians.

According to the clock, the library should have closed three minutes ago, actually, and Jonathan was nowhere to be found. Nancy didn't like the way that made her heart drop, some awful mix of disappointment and fear that could only be inspired by the conspiracy she was investigating. 

He couldn’t have decided to walk home, could he? A steady downpour had started outside, and she hated to think about him getting soaked. She was sure Steve wouldn’t let him do it either, which was maybe why he’d left before they could notice. God, his house was a far walk, too…

Nancy felt herself sigh in relief when she saw him standing on the front steps of the library, hiding from the rain under the awning. 

“I figured it might be better if she didn't see us leave together,” Jonathan explained with an awkward half-shrug. “Don’t need to give people reason to talk.”

More reason, he meant, because the Hawkins gossip mill had been convinced Nancy was having an affair with Jonathan for years now. It was a credit to Steve that he never believed them, but it also made Nancy feel twice as guilty over the attraction she absolutely did feel.

Steve tilted his chin. He told Jonathan to ignore it, most of the time, but he respected the man’s discomfort. “Time to go,” he declared as the rain slowed to a patter. “Quick, before we get too wet.”

The rain pelted and drowned Nancy’s work-approved curls, but as she splashed right into a puddle, she couldn’t help but laugh. They were like kids again. Both Steve and Jonathan had their hair plastered to their foreheads and matching grins, and Nancy slid into the back seat with a smile just as the skies opened up.

It was like someone had dumped a bucket of water over Hawkins, and it just kept falling. The wipers were flicking back and forth frantically, sluicing water to the sides, yet more kept coming to take its place. “Jesus,” Steve groused. “You can barely see two feet in front of you.” He pulled out of the parking spot and already, his fingers were tight on the steering wheel.

“Why don’t we go back to our place?” Nancy suggested. “We can just eat dinner there -” Because, she realized, in her crusade she had forgotten to eat anything since noon “- and hang out, and then when this lightens up, you can drive Jonathan home.”

Steve smiled gratefully at her and her heart melted. “Great idea, Nance.”

Normally, Jonathan would have protested that he didn’t want to impose, but he knew the bigger imposition would be asking Steve to drive in this weather, so he simply nodded and slumped back. Nancy decided it was a tired slump, as opposed to defeated.

Steve took every curve extra slowly, squinting the entire time. There were shadows on the side of the road that had to have been houses, but there was one - a person? - that lumbered across the street, making Steve swear and hit the brakes, even though the shadow was still about ten feet away. 

“Stupid teenager,” he grumbled. Nancy was not convinced it was a teenager, but she did not have a strong alternative suggestion, so she remained silent. 

It was a relief to get inside a dry house, sit in front of a nice fire. Steve gave Jonathan his old Hawkins Basketball sweatpants and a t-shirt, which he had _no right_ to look so good in, and Nancy made them all tea and a charcuterie board for dinner. She liked those because they _looked_ fancy, like she’d put in an acceptable housewife level of effort, but they were really just a deconstructed sandwich.

“Looks great, darling,” Steve praised, kissing her as she set the food on the living room table. “Shall we compare notes?” He picked up a cracker and stacked it with pepperoni and colby jack. 

Nancy was more convinced than ever that Barb was involved in whatever weird conspiracy was going on, and she’d learned a bit about Hawkins when Terry Ives came by. Jonathan had found bits here and there, including one about the construction of the lab - “In the seventies?” Nancy had asked, but he shook his head. One of the papers from ‘53 had been misfiled.

It had started as a discussion of the facts of the case, but it easily spiralled out from there, into theorizing and good-natured arguing and eye-rolling.

“I’m just saying,” Steve protested, “that we have no evidence she’s _actually_ psychic, it’s just a thing they said.”

“Actually,” Jonathan corrected timidly. “I saw her change the TV channels from across the room.” 

Steve had to admit that this was both strong evidence and pretty neat. Nancy smiled widely.

Still, the rain did not let up. It was about 10pm when Steve yawned and said, “Jonathan, why don’t you just stay the night?”

Both Nancy and Jonathan startled, though Nancy was significantly better at not showing it. They’d spent a lot of time together before, but this was new territory. 

This was a pretty big show of faith in a guy the whole town said was fucking your wife.

Jonathan looked about to insist that he couldn’t possibly impose like that when thunder cracked overhead and all the lights went out. He gazed at them in the dark. “Yeah. Okay.”

The shadows on his face made him look extra elegant and alluring, and Nancy stood up and busied herself with cleaning before her treacherous brain could go any further. She always, always made sure to hang out with Jonathan when Steve was there, to stop her from doing anything brash and stupid, but sometimes, the brash and stupid side would fight to come out anyway.

The lights flickered back on. “I’m gonna call my mom and let her know, so she doesn’t freak out,” Jonathan suggested, following Nancy into the kitchen. In normal circumstances, that sentence from the mouth of a 26-year-old would be laughable, but Joyce was a worrier, and her younger son was missing. As it was, this was just thoughtful.

Nancy definitely did not eavesdrop while she washed the plates. 

“Hey, mom. Yeah, I’m at Steve and Nancy’s place. Safe and dry.” He gave a chuckle. “We got in before the storm got too bad.” Nancy disagreed, but whatever. “Yeah. The woman’s name was Terry Ives. She -” Another crackle of thunder, and the lights went out again. “Mom?” He sighed. “Shit.”

“Well, at least she knows where you are,” Nancy tried, patting him on the shoulder with her still-damp hand.

Steve was already lighting his (white, unscented) candle collection in the living room, which he claimed was both aesthetically pleasing and functional. In this storm, Nancy couldn’t disagree. They cast a soft glow over everything, and it felt peaceful. 

“What an atmosphere, huh?” Steve put forth, smiling brightly. “Not too bad, really.”

And he wasn’t wrong. Even though the world was weird now, and it was pouring steadily outside, Nancy couldn’t think of anywhere she’d rather be right then. Not when she could be there with her two favorite people.

* * *

Lucas had insisted on driving Mike and Max to Waffle House because of the rain. They’d get soaked and probably also die on Max’s motorcycle, he very reasonably pointed out. Mike couldn’t fault him on that one. Dying would be very inconvenient to the investigation.

His mother hadn’t particularly liked that comment, but Mike stood by it. 

Even if he was contractually obligated, though, Mike pointed out that Max didn’t have to go; in response, they just stuck their tongue out at him and insisted they couldn’t interrupt their study routine. He was oddly pleased to have them there, for reasons he didn’t want to think too hard about. 

They wound up leaving Eleven with Joyce and his mother overnight. It seemed safest, even with Jonathan still out. Joyce had invited Hopper to stay on account of the rain, and the three adults could probably handle anything.

Mike tried not to think about where Hopper would be sleeping. He preserved his sanity by not thinking too hard about his mother’s relationship. 

He’d expected Lucas to just drop them off and go, but Lucas slid into the booth across from Max and ordered a plate of hash browns and bacon. It made Mike feel things to see them together, the same strange stomach twists he’d felt back in high school when the two had been dating. It wasn’t jealousy, exactly, but something kind of like it. But it felt almost...good, too. 

Will would call it ‘yearning,’ and tease Mike for not being able to figure it out himself, being the supposed wordsmith that he was. But Mike preferred to keep a somewhat estranged relationship with his emotions; the past forty-eight hours had been felt entirely too deeply, reminding him of why.

So he didn’t try to figure out what he was yearning _for_.

It was an earlier shift, which meant there were late-dinner patrons, including a couple of families. Mike didn’t know why the hell anyone would take their family here, jaded as he was from being employed. A shitty Waffle House halfway in the middle of nowhere wasn’t exactly a family treat.

Lucas gave him a megawatt smile when Mike returned with his food, and a hearty thank you. Mike felt his face heat up for no good reason, and Max gave him a knowing smirk, but he didn’t have any clue what they thought they knew.

Thunder crackled overhead, and lightning illuminated the spindly trees outside. Max winced at the sound, and Mike wanted to do something to comfort them; all he could do, though, was pour them another mug of coffee. Lucas, however, put his hand over theirs and squeezed, and Max almost smiled before they pulled their hand back and flipped the textbook page.

The lights flickered. The wiring in this stupid building was really starting to get on Mike’s nerves. 

He got $11 of tips, which wasn’t too bad, and everyone besides Lucas and Max had slowly emptied out of the place. 

“C’mon, sit for a minute,” Lucas suggested. “You’ve been on your feet for a couple hours now, take a break.” 

Normally, he wasn’t supposed to, but fuck, Mike was tired. He flopped heavily into the booth beside Lucas, receiving a reassuring pat on the shoulder. 

There was another loud clap of thunder, making Max visibly jump, and then the lights went out. 

Mike groaned. “Piece of shit building.” He pushed his head into his hands. “I don’t want to deal with this.”

As if it heard him, the lights in the building came back on in the building. 

“There you go,” Lucas offered optimistically. 

“Wheeler!” the cook bellowed. “C’mere!”

Mike groaned again and dragged himself to the back. “Yes?” He hoped it wouldn’t be a ‘clean the kitchen’ request. 

“You haven’t eaten anything this shift, kid.” Jimmy, the old man who did most of the cooking at the Waffle House, slid a plate towards him. “You’re too fucking skinny.” This was a common complaint of Jimmy’s, since he was a short and round Italian grandpa from Jersey and he was definitely using Mike as a stand-in for the grandson that never talked to him. 

Mike couldn’t complain. It was nice for someone to be looking out for him. The toast was slightly burnt, the bacon limp, but hell, it was food. “Thanks.” He buttered the toast and took a bite, wincing as the crumbs went everywhere.

“That friend of yours.” Jimmy jutted his chin out towards the dining area, clearly referring to Max. “Got a new boy with him here. Are they...y’know…?”

Jimmy, because he was a grandfather, was also a horrible gossip. 

Mike shrugged. 

“Ah, c’mon, Mikey, I know you think he’s cute.” Jimmy smiled conspiratorially; even though he was old, he held surprisingly progressive stances, so even though he thought Max was a dude, he’d never had an issue with Mike’s apparently obvious former crush. Not that Mike felt remotely qualified to explain Max’s gender. “Is that your competition? You boys vyin’ for his hand, eh?”

Okay, Jesus, Mike did not want to be having this conversation. “There’s no competition,” he declared, then shoved a strip of bacon in his mouth. It was true: one, he wasn’t trying to date Max, and two, Lucas was and would always be the better choice between them. 

Lucas was the ideal boyfriend. He was sweet and funny and he’d do anything for his partner. Mike had seen it time and time again in the beginning of high school, and then he’d seen the way Lucas spent the rest of high school trying to win Max back while also supporting and respecting their decisions.

Mike wouldn’t stand a chance. And honestly, he was okay with that. 

Jimmy made an unconvinced noise. “Well, I think he’s winning, anyway.” They both looked out through the kitchen window and Mike saw Max with their head tossed back in a laugh, cheeks flushed and eyes scrunched up. 

God, they were beautiful. 

“Good thing you don’t care.” Jimmy gave a shrug. “Eh. Plenty of pretty boys and girls out there, Mikey. You’ll find your fish.” He patted Mike on the shoulder, which meant the conversation was over, and Mike slid the plate in with the rest of the dishes.

Mike shoved his hands into the soapy water rather than go out and rejoin Max and Lucas. He should do the dishes. He should do what he was paid for. He didn’t enjoy it, exactly, but he liked the way his hands felt under the hot water and how the simple, rhythmic motions took up his whole brain in some sort of meditative way. More importantly, it was better than being out there.

Normally, he’d think about the comic book he was working on with Will, but tonight, all he could think about was Max, Lucas, and Monsters.

There weren’t very many dishes. No one else had come in, and Mike knew no one else was going to, especially not in this weather. He went back out to the dining room, but he avoided meeting Lucas’ eye, choosing to wipe down every single table. He should do the things he was being paid to do.

The whole building lit up fluorescent with lightning, and out on the edges of the trees, Mike saw...something. But then the thunder cracked, and the lights went out in the restaurant, and he didn’t see anything when he looked again.

After a minute, Mike sighed heavily. There was an umbrella in the kitchen that he grabbed before tromping out into the rain, sneakers _immediately_ getting soaked. There was a storm cellar under the building, which held the backup generator that should have kicked on by now and some candles. 

He could see barely through the restaurant windows. It was still dark. There was a shadow that had to be Jimmy putzing around in the kitchen, and Max and Lucas still silhouetted at the table. It felt odd to be on the outside looking in. 

The cellar was dank, and it smelled like death. Mike left the umbrella on the stairs and felt his way through the dark, patting along the wall until he hit something and knocked it over with a clatter. 

It turned out to be a bunch of candles. At least one part of his mission was accomplished. He kept creeping forward slowly, slowly, until his foot hit the back wall.

Strange. The generator should have been...Mike leaned down and patted his way across the wall, recoiling where it felt _sticky_ and almost alive. Gross. He’d have to tell his boss, and someone else could clean the mold or whatever the hell. 

He hit the generator with more force than expected, sending a crack of pain through his left hand. He swore. But it felt wrong, somehow, and he realized there was something...growing on it.

And then the wall in front of him yawned. 

Dim light came through and illuminated the dust in the air of the cellar, and the vines that had taken over the generator, choking it off. But Mike was more preoccupied with the _hole_ in the wall that seemed to have something on the other side.

He wanted to investigate, but he couldn’t while Jimmy was still in the kitchen. Besides, Max would probably kill him for having adventures without them.

Mike picked up the umbrella again and headed back inside. 

“Mikey, why’s it still dark?” Jimmy demanded. “We’re open rain or shine; even in disaster, we stay open.”

Mike shook his head. “Generator’s shot. There’s no way we’re getting it back on tonight. Go home, I’ll close up and leave a note on the door.”

Jimmy whistled. “First time in twenty years I get to go home early.” He grinned. “You’re a good kid, Wheeler. Get home safe, eh?”

Mike watched Jimmy get into his car before locking the back doors and leaving the kitchen. Max turned to look at him, the tension in their shoulders at odds with the levity in their voice as they demanded, “Where are the lights, Wheeler?”

“Got a lighter?” he asked instead of answering. They nodded and handed it over and he lit the emergency candle. “There’s something you guys have to see.”

He locked the doors behind them and led them over to the cellar. Lucas gallantly allowed Max under the umbrella with Mike and his candle, but everyone ended up sopping wet anyway.

The cellar was no less eerie now that it was lit by a candle. Boxes were covered in those spores, and the generator was still in disrepair, but the wall…

“What am I supposed to be looking at?” Max demanded. “Cuz all I see is dust and plants.”

“There was a hole - a door -” Mike stumbled forward, and his hand _sank_ into the wall.

Lucas swore. “Holy…”

It was pulling at him, just a little. Mike yanked his hand back and was rewarded with a hole like a bloody wound in the wall. He shoved the candle in it and forced it wider. 

“See?” Mike pointed. “Will _has_ to be in there. He’s not anywhere in our dimension, he’s where the monster is from.” He made to start through the hole in the wall and got two hands on his wrist, holding him in place.

“Wheeler, what the fuck do you think you’re doing?” Max demanded.

Lucas, true to fashion, was gentler and full of logic. “Mike, we don’t know what’s in there, we don’t have any sort of plan. You already saw the wall move - what if it closes, and you get stuck over there, too?”

Mike didn’t want to admit he had a point. “But Will needs me!” he protested.

“Will needs you _alive_ and _whole_ ,” Max snapped back. “We’ll come up with a plan and go in tomorrow.”

“But -”

“Mike, when was the last time you slept?” Lucas asked softly. Mike deflated. “Come on. Let’s go home.”

Mike slid into the back seat before Max could try it again. He didn’t feel like being up front. His jeans were wet on the leather seats and when he took his shoes off, water flowed out. 

Lucas patted his steering wheel. “I’m so sorry, baby,” he whispered, ostensibly to his car. It was kind of cute, for reasons Mike couldn’t explain.

Max’s hair was already dry, being shaved, and the texture of Lucas’ hair had the same effect, though the neat twists he’d had in were starting to come a bit undone. Mike, on the other hand, was pretty sure he looked exactly as much like a wet sheepdog as he felt.

None of them said anything as Lucas drove, going about twenty under the speed limit to make sure he didn’t hydroplane. The rain would lighten for a minute or two, nearly a drizzle, and then it would start up again in torrents. Max continued to jump at every thunderclap. Lucas was pretending not to notice, so Mike followed his lead.

There was a cop car outside his house, one that didn’t belong to Hopper or any of the locals. It was the state police, logo bright on the side, and Mike could dimly make out someone on his porch. 

Max and Lucas glanced at each other apprehensively. 

Mike left the car, not bothering with the umbrella. The rain had lightened enough that it wasn’t pounding, and it wasn’t like he could get any wetter, anyhow. 

“Are you Michael Wheeler?” asked the man on his porch. Mike nodded numbly. “I’m afraid I have some bad news for you.”

What kind of bad news could state police have for him?

“Your...friend - roommate -” The man stumbled awkwardly over his words. “Will Byers. We, uh. We found his body.”

If Mike hadn’t already been soaked, he’d have felt the chill as all of him froze. As it was, he just continued to shiver.

“That can’t be right,” he said after a silence that he knew lasted too long.

The man looked uncomfortable as hell, like he’d like to be anywhere but here. Mike would also like him to be anywhere but here. “Afraid so. It looks like he jumped off the quarry. Suicide.”

That was wrong. That wasn’t like Will at all. Sure, things were tough, but he always had an easier time with optimism than Mike did. It should be Will getting this news and Mike floating at the bottom of the quarry. 

“You can come see the body in the morning,” the man suggested. “For now...Well, I’m sorry for your loss.”

And then he got in his car, and he drove away.

Mike managed to stand for a minute and a half before his knees buckled.

“Easy, easy.” Lucas caught him before he could hit the porch. “What was that about, man?”

“Will,” Mike rasped. “They...they said they found his body.”

Max and Lucas shared a look. Mike wasn’t even sure why either of them was still around; both of them had places to go home to. 

He said as much and Max scoffed. “We’re not leaving you alone after that,” they told him, as if he was stupid to even consider it. Lucas nodded in agreement. “C’mon, let’s get you inside and get you wasted.”

Lucas winced. “I don’t know if that’s the best idea.”

“Well, as I see it, there are two possibilities,” Max began pragmatically. “Either the cop is right, and he’s dead, or he’s not and we’re going to have to go rescue him from an alternate dimension. Both of which are _excellent_ reasons to get drunk.”

“You both have families,” Mike protested. “Who are probably worried, because it’s late…” He was shooting himself in the foot. He knew he was arguing against his own desires - god, he didn’t want to be alone - and he couldn’t help it.

Max snorted. “Hardly. C’mon, Wheeler, let’s take this pity party somewhere dry.”

“My parents understand that I’m an adult,” Lucas added. “I can stay the night.”

Mike nodded numbly, not even flinching when Max reached into his front pocket and pulled out his house keys. They gave him a look of concern and put the key in the lock with much steadier hands than his own.

He flicked the light switch unthinkingly. Nothing happened for a minute, but then the lights turned on. 

“Guess the power’s back,” he mumbled. They could’ve stayed at the Waffle House til the end of his shift. Then he wouldn’t have to feel this right now.

Bereft. Torn apart and emptied out.

Lucas and Max shared a look, and then Lucas was calmly leading Mike towards the bathroom. “Let’s get you dry, okay?”

Even though Mike knew he was an adult and should be wholly capable of doing this himself, feeling Lucas run a towel through his hair, over his shoulders - it was grounding. It felt good, almost, even as Mike shivered and cracked from the news.

Max appeared for a brief moment, just to chuck some fresh clothes through the door, and then they were gone again.

Lucas stripped him, and Mike felt his face heat up. It’s not like they’d never seen each other naked; they’d grown up together. Except Lucas looked well-fed and had put on some muscle while away at college. Mike was scrawny as he’d ever been, with the protrusive bottom ribs to match.

Lucas was handsome, and Mike was (as usual) a mess.

“Bro, you can change your boxers your damn self,” Lucas said, bringing him back to present. He placed the towel down next to Mike.

In spite of the fact he’d been the one with the umbrella, Mike was somehow the wettest. Typical. Lucas’ jeans and t-shirt already looked almost dry, though he’d peeled off his wet socks, and he left Mike to finish changing, presumably to go check on Max. Mike shivered a bit more in his bathroom, not wanting to leave and go be around people, not wanting to be alone.

Mike didn’t believe in...anything, really. This whole “monsters and alternate dimensions” thing was really taxing him. But even so, he knew Will was the other half of his soul. Not in a romantic way - Will had had a crush on him in sixth grade, sure, and then Mike had had a crush on Will junior year, though nothing ever came of it - but in a way that they’d simply been designed to occupy the same space. The comic book they wrote together, the house they lived in, their mothers, their siblings...all of it.

“C’mon. You’ve been moping in here too long.” Max pushed open the bathroom door without bothering to knock. He scrambled to his feet - when had he sat down? - and crossed his arms over his still bare chest. “Jesus, Wheeler, I’m in med school, I’ve seen a nipple before.” They rolled their eyes. “I assume you’ll want to put a shirt on to keep your modesty intact for Lucas, of course, so he knows you’re a virtuous virgin -”

“Hey!” Mike was, in fact, a virgin, and typically not ashamed of it, though he resented Max making it out to be a morality thing as opposed to just that he hadn’t wanted to sleep with anyone yet. “We’re not fucking Puritans.”

“Oh, he knows what a Puritan is!” Max grinned. “Hurry your ass, Wheeler, you had rum so I made us hot chocolate and it’s gonna get cold.”

He didn’t quite follow. “I thought you wanted to get drunk?” 

Max rolled their eyes. “Two things. One, I want to get _you_ drunk, and two, the rum is in the hot chocolate and will definitely assist us on that journey.”

_“I want to get you drunk”_ was a sentence that sent a ridiculous amount of heat down his spine. It was the closest he’d gotten to flirting with anyone...ever, really. 

Mike Wheeler was not a hot commodity at Hawkins High, and nothing ever really changed.

He swallowed thickly. “Yeah. Yeah, okay.” And Jesus Christ, this was Max Mayfield, and why the _hell_ did they still have this effect on him nearly a decade later? He didn’t even _like_ them, really.

Lucas was messing with Mike’s record player in the living room. “Nice choice,” he praised, holding up one of Mike’s numerous Queen discs.

Wouldn’t be much of a house with a bisexual and a gay man if there wasn’t Queen, Mike figured, but he kept his mouth shut.

Max was fantastic at making spiked hot chocolate, Mike discovered, and he definitely drank his a bit faster than he should have. He hadn’t asked how much rum was in it, but he was already feeling...something, that’s for sure.

Feeling warm, and loose, and relaxed. Something close to happy. The reality of the past few days tried battering against his consciousness, but it was easy enough to ignore while Max made more hot chocolate and Lucas spun records and they all sang. Even Mike threw in a few bars.

“Here you go.” Max pressed the refilled mug into Mike’s hands. He could tell they were feeling something too, and maybe even Lucas - there had been “quite frankly shit” beer, according to Max, but beer nonetheless consumed between the first and second hot chocolate. Their hand rested on his shoulder, just kind of staying put, and it felt nice.

Lucas was digging through the record collection and he let out a gasp as he found one that particularly excited him. Mike didn’t manage to see what it was before Lucas was playing it, but he recognized the opening notes of _Rebel, Rebel_ like he recognized his own heartbeat. It was one of Nancy’s favorite songs, and for once, Mike had to agree with her.

It took about a measure and a half for Lucas’ hips to start going, and he shot Mike a grin on the “Dontcha?” of the opening. Mike’s heart fluttered. 

And then…

“You’ve gotcha mother in a whirl, cuz she’s - not sure if you’re a boy or a girl!” His eyes were on Max and he was beaming, and Max was growing steadily redder. “Hey babe, your hair’s alright -” He patted their head. “Hey babe, let’s go out tonight.”

The tension ratcheted up as Lucas sang, nearly imploring, “You like me, and I like it all.”

It hit Mike then, like a stack of Dustin’s new science textbooks. He was in love with Lucas. He probably had been for a while, now that he thought about it, and he felt acutely jealous as Lucas continued to flirt with a drunk and flustered Max via Bowie song.

Mike stifled a groan. This was why he didn’t think about feelings.

But he couldn’t stop now that he’d started, and a lot of things made more sense than they had, including his weird rivalry with Max in high school that almost definitely had to do with being jealous of the relationship they got to have. 

And then threw it away, too - Mike remembered being absolutely livid for a straight week, refusing to talk to Max for breaking Lucas’ heart, until he found them crying underneath the bleachers and realized that they were still his friend, too, even if he was mad. That’d been a weird time.

Lucas had managed to get Max in his arms and Mike felt the familiar emotions. It was obvious Max still had feelings for him. Hell, it had been obvious the whole time, that Max had never stopped loving him, and Mike had never been able to figure out why they broke up with him in the first place.

He wondered if they were finally going to start dating again. Something about crazy situations had a way of bringing people together. He would be willing to bet money that Will was going to _finally_ act on his crush on Dustin by the end of this, having survived such -

The state trooper’s words came crashing back and Mike let out one choked off sob.

Of course, this happened at the same time as the song ended, so there was only the scratching of a played-out record in the background and nothing to obscure the sound that he made.

Lucas was on his knees in front of Mike in an instant, gazing at him with such gentle concern that Mike’s stomach flipped at least three times before settling. Max was picking out another record, leaving the calming of Mike to Lucas.

“Are you okay?” Lucas asked, then winced, because of course he wasn’t, that was the whole fucking point. 

“C’mon, Wheeler, get up and dance,” Max suggested, breaking in, and some upbeat guitar underscored their words. Lucas nodded, tugging Mike to his feet, and then twirled him the same way as Max and sang along just the same. 

“I don't care if Monday's blue - Tuesday's grey and Wednesday too,” Lucas crooned, grinning at Mike, and he couldn’t help but smile back.

“The Cure releases nothing but perfection,” Max declared definitively, “and even though this is outside their normal genre, it is situationally appropriate.”

Mike choked back a laugh. “How is a song about falling in love situationally appropriate?”

“Because,” Max replied patronizingly, but they were smiling at him. “It’s a ‘throw your hands in the air, let's get happy kind of record.’” Mike knew they were quoting somebody, especially because of the fake English accent they put on, but he didn’t know who. It was still cute. “And that is exactly what we need right now.”

Lucas sighed, but without any real bite. “Both of you shut up, I’m trying to sing.”

So he sang, and they drank more, and they danced until they fell asleep in a pile on the living room floor.


	4. Lost and Found Families

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warnings for this chapter include: more mentions of a suicide that didn't actually happen, period-typical homophobia referenced in a one-off with the word "d*ke", more references to medical abuse and sexual assault

Joyce Byers was a very tired woman.

As a result of the storm, which had continued into the early hours, she had her ex-boyfriend - god, she was well past forty, saying “ex-boyfriend” made her feel like a child - sleeping on the couch in her living room, which she knew for a fact he was too tall for and was definitely fucking up his back. 

She also had a psychic twelve-year-old sharing a room with the girl who had come to be her daughter after the woman she’d been in love with since she was thirteen had an existential crisis, divorced her husband, and told Joyce that her feelings were returned, actually. 

(They very politely did not mention the times when Karen had stood by while her friends scribbled “dyke” on Joyce’s locker. It didn’t really matter at this point, and Joyce understood.)

A nerdy child she’d watched grow into an adult - an adult she was pretty sure was going to become her son-in-law one of these days - was also asleep in the living room next to Hopper, not having wanted to drive in the weather last night. Meanwhile, one of her sons was at Nancy and Steve’s house - not that Joyce had any other details, since the power had cut in the middle of their phone call - and her other son was _missing_ , likely as part of a huge government conspiracy.

So yes, Joyce Byers was tired. 

When a state trooper showed up on her doorstep at an ungodly hour of morning to tell her that her younger son was in fact dead - a suicide - she had no strength to do anything but laugh. 

“Thank you for the news, Officer,” she managed, and shut the door. 

The man looked incredibly relieved to be able to walk away from the house.

Hopper looked at her, incredibly concerned. “Joyce, why are you laughing?” Apparently, the exchange had woken him, though Dustin continued to sleep like a log. “That’s _terrible_.”

She shook her head. “He’s not dead,” she said with certainty. “He wouldn’t kill himself.”

“Joyce…” Hopper tried, with a look of worry on his face. The same look of worry he’d had when he’d told her Lonnie could never be a good father for her children, that she wasn’t giving baby Jonathan and herself what they deserved. 

He’d been right then, even if she’d been too frustrated to see it, but he was wrong now. 

She called Nancy. 

“Harrington residence, how may I help you?” Nancy asked. Joyce knew it would be her because Nancy woke up earlier than either man by at least a half hour.

“May I speak to Jonathan, please?” she asked.

“Oh, Joyce! Of course.” She heard a scuffle through the phone as Nancy presumably left. Joyce started to giggle again.

Hopper sighed and took the phone out of her hand. “Jonathan?” he asked, then waited for a beat. “Yes, you’d better come home. They found your brother’s body.” He sighed deeply. “I’m sorry, son.” 

Joyce wondered what Jonathan would say, if he’d know like she did. Damn everyone else, she could still _feel_ Will, same as she’d always been able to, even if it was cloudy and felt strange. 

“Mmhmm. Bye.” Hopper hung up with a click. He glanced at Joyce. “You should tell Mike.”

Okay, now she was getting annoyed. “He’s not _dead_ ,” she snapped.

“ _Joyce_ ,” Hopper snapped back, sounding tired and frustratingly sure of himself.

“What are you two bickering about now?” Karen demanded. Hopper was the only man who’d ever been (or would be) allowed to see her without her makeup, wrapped in her pink floral housecoat early in the morning.

“Will’s dead,” Hopper said before Joyce could say anything, and she was pretty sure he did it just to annoy her. 

“He’s _not_ ,” she insisted.

Karen waved her hands at the two of them. “Back up,” she demanded. “Where - how - why are you saying that?” She was looking at the two of them like they were her kids having a fight. “Start from the beginning.”

“A State Trooper came to the door and told us they found Will’s body,” Hopper explained.

“Told _me_ ,” Joyce corrected peevishly. “Said he killed himself, but Will wouldn’t _do_ that. Besides, he didn’t even tell me where I could go to identify the body.”

“Because you shut the door in his face!” Hopper shot back.

“Joyce, that’s rude,” Karen said automatically, crossing her arms. 

Joyce gave her a sour look. “I know.” She did not need to be mothered by her life partner.

“Right, sorry.” Karen exhaled slowly, keeping her eyes closed. “Okay, well…They said he’s dead. They could be wrong and it’s someone else,” she suggested.

“Or they could be lying,” Joyce added.

Both Hopper and Karen looked at her skeptically. “Why would they lie about your son being dead?” Karen was the one to ask. 

Joyce flapped her hand in the direction of Holly’s room. “The same reason there are ‘bad men’ hunting a psychic little girl?”

Karen looked poised to argue - she wasn’t completely sold on the whole “supernatural elements” part of this situation - but she was interrupted when the door opened, and through it stumbled one very red-eyed Mike Wheeler, followed by Max and Lucas. 

Joyce jerked her thumb. “There. We don’t have to call him.”

“Michael Wheeler, are you hungover?” Karen demanded. 

He looked at her in disbelief. “Mother, I am 22 years old.”

“You have to set a good example for your sister! And the little girl you’ve basically adopted.”

“Both of whom are currently asleep, in Holly’s room, not here.” Mike frowned. “You have to know. I have an _excellent_ reason to be hungover.” He also had the eyes of someone who wished they were still drunk, but Joyce didn’t comment on it. 

“He’s not dead,” she said instead. 

Hopper opened his mouth, probably to tell her off again, but Lucas cut in diplomatically, “That is a possibility we’ve considered, yes.”

“Mom!” Jonathan burst into the house too, followed by Nancy and Steve holding more flowers. It really was getting to be a full house. 

He was so tall, her boy. He wrapped her in a hug, snuffling softly. “Mom, I’m so sorry.”

“He’s not dead,” she said again, feeling very much like a record skipping in the player.

“Mom,” Jonathan protested softly. 

“What the hell is going on?” Dustin was a heavy sleeper, but this was a lot, even for him. 

“Will’s dead,” Hopper replied tersely. 

“That’s impossible.”

Max sighed. “I think we’re divided into two camps here,” they pointed out. “Everyone that’s seen the weird shit believes in the possibility he might still be alive. Everyone that hasn’t, doesn’t really understand...”

Jonathan frowned. “I don’t -” He broke off, clearly not knowing where to go. Nancy leaned into his side, and he leaned right back, relishing the support. 

Joyce really did hope those three figured themselves out soon.

“The officer told you Will was dead,” Karen began. “I think -”

“We found something,” Mike blurted out. “I think - I think I know where Will is, if he’s alive.”

“You can’t know -” Hopper protested.

“There’s a portal in the cellar at the Waffle House,” Mike added. “If I go through -”

“No.”

Eleven had emerged from Holly’s room, wearing one of Jonathan’s t-shirts as a nightgown over Holly’s leggings and a pair of hot pink socks. She was quite a spectacle, especially with her shaved head.

Joyce recovered first. “What do you mean, sweetie?”

“Portal. No.”

“But if Will is alive -” Mike started, only to be cut off by Eleven.

“He is.”

Mike’s voice was reaching a fever pitch. “Then I have to!” 

“ _No._ ” Eleven insisted. “Dangerous. Bad men. _Monsters_.” The girl was looking at him with intense worry and love, and Joyce marveled at the depth of connection that’d formed so quickly. She seemed hell-bent on keeping Mike safe.

Mike raked a hand through his hair and took a step towards Eleven, holding up his hands in what Joyce assumed was supposed to be a placating manner. “I know,” he assured her. “I know it’s dangerous. But I can handle it. I need - I need to get to Will. I’ll be safe,” he offered. 

“I said _No!_ ” she shrieked, and then Mike was hitting the wall and sliding to the ground.

Karen’s eyes widened. This was the first evidence she’d seen of any sort of psychic capability. “Michael!” She looked ready to rush to her son, but Max was already there, checking him over.

Eleven looked horrified with herself. “I! I - I - didn’t -” The poor dear didn’t seem to have the words to articulate anything. “I’m - sorry!”

“It’s okay,” Joyce started to promise, but at that point, the girl had already bolted out the door. “Shit.” 

There were too many damn people in her tiny house, and all of them were concerned with Mike, so by the time Joyce made it onto the front porch, Eleven was nowhere to be seen. “Shit,” she said again, with more feeling. The girl wasn’t even wearing shoes.

She had just as hard of a time pushing her way back _inside_ , where she found Mike swatting at Karen’s worried hands and insisting he was fine. He looked dazed, but otherwise okay, and Max said - with an exasperation that told Joyce this was not the first time - that he hit his head hard and they should be careful but that nothing else was an issue.

There were too many _goddamn_ people in her house, and it took Joyce several minutes to get all their attention. “There are usually less people involved in horror movies,” she groused. 

Hopper sighed like she was being melodramatic. “It’s not a horror movie.”

“Well, good, cuz the twelve-year-old girl just ran away and in a horror movie that would _not_ end well.” She raked a hand through her hair. “And it won’t end well here, either, unless we _do something_ about it.”

Mike’s face went ashen. “She can’t - she can’t be alone out there!” He struggled to his feet. “There are people looking for her!”

Lucas put a soothing hand on Mike’s shoulder, squeezing lightly and rubbing his thumb back and forth. “We know, Mike,” he said softly. “We all know the stakes.”

Max was chewing on their lip fervently, to the point Joyce expected blood to well up soon. “Where would she run off to?” they asked, not looking at anyone else; their eyes stayed firmly on their fingers, which were shaking just a bit. “Where would she go to feel safe?”

Joyce was about to protest that she had no idea, that none of them could have any idea, but Nancy cut in first. “Her mom’s house,” she suggested. In response to several questioning stares, she elaborated, “She heard everything we said yesterday, and she probably knew her mother at some point anyway. Where does a kid run to feel safe? Their mother’s.”

Mike groaned. “But that doesn’t help, we have no idea where her mom lives - or even if that is her mom!”

“It’s the best lead we’ve got,” Nancy replied stonily. “Besides, I’m an investigative journalist.” She did not say ‘aspiring,’ which Joyce considered very self-actualized. “I can find her. You guys -” she waved her hand “- you guys go do what you need to do about Will and that weird portal you found.”

“She said it was dangerous!” Karen protested. 

This earned two matching eyerolls from her older kids, and a frustrated sigh from Mike that “everything is dangerous, mom.”

“He’s my son,” Joyce said quietly, staring levelly at Mike. 

He nodded slowly. “I’ll bring him back,” he promised. “You need to stay here. Take care of my mom and Holly. Make sure -” Mike swallowed thickly “- make sure he has something good to come back to.”

“Michael Wheeler!” Karen shouted, but he was already out the door, Lucas and Max immediately behind him. 

Dustin clasped her hand. “We’ll be fine, Ms. Wheeler,” he promised, then turned and hurried out after his friends. 

She stared helplessly at the door, but she didn’t say anything, just sighed and marched into the kitchen, probably to cook something. It always calmed Karen down to cook, and none of them had eaten breakfast yet. It was nice to have her.

“Make yourselves at home,” Joyce suggested to Nancy and Steve. “I’ll grab you the phonebook, and you can start digging.”

* * *

Though it was early in the afternoon, the cloud cover made it look like evening in Chicago. It hadn’t started raining yet, but Kali was sure the skies would open up soon, hence why she was herding people around like a sheepdog.

“Come on, this way, take your cart,” she directed mindlessly, encouraging several members of Chicago’s homeless population towards where Funshine had the van idling. 

“Take everything you want to keep,” Mick added. “We’ll bring you back here, but the storm is supposed to be a bad one, so just in case.”

Mick always had a way with words and people that Kali didn’t. It was one of the million things Kali loved about her. She watched as Mick helped an older man carefully pack up his meager belongings in a tote bag they’d brought, so he wouldn’t have to use a plastic bag, and she smiled thinly. 

“Alright, Boss, hop on.” Axel patted the back of his motorcycle after the encampment was cleared out. “Let’s lead these people home.”

Kali rolled her eyes. “I told you to stop calling me that.” But she got on the back of the bike nonetheless and held back a grin as Axel sped ahead of the van to start leading Funshine to the nearby empty building he’d chosen as today’s shelter. 

In the beginning, they used to bring people back to _their_ home, shelter them in the main hold until the storm passed. It was a habit Funshine had started long before he’d found Kali, fourteen and soaked to the bone and utterly bedraggled. It was the habit that let her meet her family. 

But as their illegal activities increased, it had become too dangerous to keep that up, so Axel started to scout out abandoned places throughout the city. Kali was pretty sure at this point her family knew more about the city of Chicago and its less-than-picturesque-side than anyone, especially Chicago cops.

Fuck them.

Kali liked the Magnificent Mile - it was a good place to pick pockets. But areas like this, with an old empty building that used to be a strip mall, were what really made up the city. 

Funshine ushered everyone out of the van and in through the broken door, towards the back of what appeared to have been a shoe store. There were rows and rows of empty shelves, but the more important part was the roof - even if the lights didn’t work, which Axel had confirmed and Dottie hadn’t been able to change, it was warm enough and more importantly dry.

She managed to sit for five and a half minutes, which was definitely a record, before she got antsy and started to pace. 

“Axel, I’m taking your bike.” He didn’t even protest, just tossed her the keys. “I’m going to go find some food.”

He gave her a lazy salute. “Fuck it up, li’l sis. Don’t get hit by lightning. Unless you could survive that?” he asked.

“No, Axel, I could not survive a lightning strike.” Kali rolled her eyes. Over a decade later and he still didn’t seem to grasp that she only had a small, specific set of powers, not that she was some sort of invulnerable god or something. 

Axel never wore a helmet, which Mick chided him for, stating his organs were probably too rotted to donate anyway, but Kali always had hers. It was as much for style and anonymity as it was for safety. It matched the leather jacket, gave her face cover, and kept her from spilling her brains on the pavement. 

Kali never crashed, but drivers were terrible in this godforsaken city, and she’d definitely gotten damn close sometimes. Close enough that Mick wouldn’t stop holding her for a couple days, that Funshine pulled his ‘big brother’ act twice as hard. 

The wet pavement didn’t make it any easier, but Kali sped along the street and dodged cars like a professional. She had to put some distance between herself and their shelter, for a couple reasons: it was stupid to steal where you live, and besides, that community was poor anyway. It wouldn’t be justice to leave one person starving just to feed another. 

No, she wanted to find the nice neighborhoods. The ones with the upscale grocery stores that charged far too much for a can of tuna. The ones that actually had real fruit, which Kali hadn’t seen in at least a week and a half, and god, she was dying for an apple.

Striding in with her leather bag was easy enough. Slipping fruits and crackers and various groceries into the bag required simply a wave and an illusory flutter to redirect others’ attention, to make sure they didn’t see anything in her hands. Sometimes, just for the thrill of it, she’d distract a nearby shopper with something big, like a bunch of cans falling, and then laugh when they went to investigate and found nothing there.

There was a tingling in the back of her skull, right at the base, but she couldn’t tell why. She kept glancing around surreptitiously, trying to see if she was being watched, but there was no one who could be causing the feeling.

Just to be bold and flip a middle finger to the establishment, Kali grabbed some baked goods. No nutritional value, totally unnecessary - but hey, the urban poor deserved nice things, too. Now was the hard part - getting out. She’d been in the store too long to just walk through the doors without being suspicious, and in spite of the way Axel treated her, she couldn’t actually turn invisible. She stood by a display of cakes, eyeing the door, running calculations. Two cashiers, one shopper, and the baker behind her: four people to avoid. 

Fire was always a good distraction. The bakery had little cake samples in paper wrappers with toothpicks - Kali took two, because she could - and immediately next to it was a trash can for detritus. She could light it on fire for real, but she rather liked this lighter, so she opted to walk away slowly and flick her wrist backwards. 

She very steadily did not look back, even as she heard the baker swearing loudly, but she did let her lip curl.

The cashiers and customer didn’t seem to notice, so just for good measure, Kali gave the illusion of smoke wafting right in front of them. That got three wide-eyed startles, as everyone turned towards the bakery - currently apparently on fire - and Kali swept right past all of them, out the door. 

It was too easy, but she knew she shouldn’t complain. Better too easy than someone got hurt. Funshine had spent six months behind bars over something stupid, and they were not coincidentally the six worst months of Kali’s life. Including spending time in that fucking lab. 

She slipped the helmet back on, feeling the rain hit her leather jacket steadily, and that feeling at her neck was still there. She tried to ignore it as she revved the engine, peeling off onto the street, letting the wind and rain and the sense of danger distract her, but it wouldn’t go away. 

There was a pair of cop cars on the road that was the fastest way back, so Kali took a sharp turn into a back alleyway, barely room for her between the back fence and the next building. It was the only reason why she didn’t wipe out when she had to slam the brakes three-quarters of the way through.

“Jesus Christ!” she hissed. Standing in front of her was a twelve-year-old, sopping wet with no shoes, that she’d almost run over. “What the fuck, kid?”

“Sister,” the kid said, and nothing else. 

Kali didn’t know what the fuck that meant, but the tingling at the back of her neck grew stronger. She was used to this, though, kids on the street who didn’t say much, so she jerked her chin at the back of the bike for the kid to get on. Neither of them could be having much fun in this pouring rain, which was working its way through her leather jacket and jeans. 

The kid didn’t move. 

Kali huffed impatiently and reached out to grab the kid’s hand and pull; instead, the kid wrapped their skinny, pale fingers around her wrist, thumb stroking over the latticework of messy scars.

“It’s gone.” They blinked at her owlishly, like they expected something to be there. Like they knew, somehow. 

“Kid, it’s fucking _pouring_ ,” Kali groused. “Get on the bike.” 

The kid complied, small arms wrapping around her waist. She put the helmet on their head, because it seemed appropriate, and started up her engine again. 

When she got back to their shelter, she banged on the side of the van. “Dottie! We got any spare clothes?”

The girl shoved her head out the back. “Of course.” She rolled her eyes. “The question is what size?”

Instead of answering, Kali took her helmet off the kid’s head and shoved them forward. They didn’t stumble, which she admired. “Dry clothes for the kid.” She shook herself like a sheepdog. “And me, if you’ve got.”

“Mick’s spares are dry, your girlfriend won’t care.” Dottie gestured over her shoulder. “Knock yourself out. C’mon, Sweetie.” This was directed at the kid. “Get in here, out of the rain.”

The kid clambered inside gracelessly and fell in a heap at Dottie’s feet, prompting a chuckle from the girl. 

“Let’s see what we’ve got,” Dottie mumbled, more to the world at large than the kid, and started digging through a garbage bag in the corner. “Hm. How about this?” A ripped gray t-shirt, small but would definitely fit the kid better than what they were currently wearing.

Kali felt their eyes burning a hole in her back as she stripped out of her wet clothes, sliding on one of Mick’s sweaters. It was a deep ruby red, which wasn’t really her style, but it was dry, which was more important. The kid wanted something, Kali was sure of it.

When she turned back around, Dottie had made an outfit of oversized denim overalls over a too-small gray t-shirt, black socks on the kid’s feet and a pair of boots that actually seemed to fit properly by some miracle.

Kali wanted to deliver the food, but more importantly, she wanted to figure out what the fuck was up with this kid. 

“You got a family?” she asked. It seemed like a good place to start, see if there was somewhere they needed to get this kid back to.

“Sister,” the kid repeated, then extended their arm. 

Three neat digits. 011. 

Kali’s heart sped up. This was the baby from the lab. The one she’d abandoned in her escape all those years ago.

She remembered the sirens, the sound of the baby crying as she’d run as fast and as hard as she could. Her powers were only good for illusions, for distractions and hiding, and she didn’t have the time or the ability to go back for the little girl. She’d cried the whole way out of the lab, she’d cried with the pine needles digging into her bare feet, and she’d cried as she’d hitchhiked to Chicago. She’d cried as she killed a man for trying to touch her wrong, and cried as she drove his stolen car all the way to Chicago.

Then she’d met Funshine, and she hadn’t cried since.

“Gone,” the girl said, reaching out and taking Kali’s wrist. And of course she’d expect something to be there - she’d expect Kali’s own ‘008’ tattoo. There’s no way she could have anticipated Kali taking a pocketknife to that skin and carving it up until the numbers weren’t there anymore.

Kali nodded. “Yeah. Gone.”

“Hurt you?” she asked. “The bad men?”

Kali shook her head, absently running her fingers over the scars. “No, I did this to myself. To take back my identity.”

“Identity?” The girl sounded out the word carefully.

“Yeah. Who I am because I say I am, not just a number, not some experiment for the men in the lab. My name’s Kali,” she offered. “Do you know yours?”

The girl tapped the tattoo. “Name.”

Kali shook her head, remembering flashes of blonde hair and smiles and the nice young white woman who’d kept her company during the years of experiments. “Jane,” she corrected. “Your mother named you Jane.”

“Jane.” She tried it out. “My name...is Jane.”

Kali nodded. “Your mother’s name was Terry,” she added, feeling guilty she couldn’t remember the woman’s last name. “She was my friend at the lab. She told me not to be afraid, that everything would be okay.” It was a lie. Kali was pretty sure Terry was dead, and she’d had to leave Jane behind when she ran, and now the kid had twelve years of the same trauma Kali endured and she couldn’t do anything to stop it.

“This is your sister?” Dottie asked. Her multi-colored curls bobbed as she gestured with her chin. She didn’t look suspicious or confused like some might, at seeing a little white girl call herself Kali’s family. She knew how these things worked. 

Kali nodded. “Same lab.” Everyone knew where she came from. Dottie had broken out of a mental hospital, so she could often relate to Kali’s institutional stories. 

Dottie’s eyes grew wide. “We’re keeping her, right?”

Kali looked at Jane searchingly. “I’m sorry,” she said, and her voice cracked embarrassingly. She took a deep breath. “I’m sorry, Jane. I failed to save you when you were a baby. But if you will let me, I’ll take care of you now. Nothing will ever happen to you again.” Kali would make damn sure of that.

“Family?” Jane asked softly.

Kali nodded. “We’re family.”

With surprising ferocity, Jane launched herself at Kali into a bone-crushing hug. Kali hadn’t smiled that wide in months, and she even laughed. Dottie laughed too, and then Jane did, though she didn’t seem to know what she was laughing _at_. 

It was still cloudy and dark outside, but the rain had lightened to a drizzle, and Kali felt herself sunny in spite of the weather. 

“C’mon.” Kali patted Jane’s shoulder. “Let me go introduce you to the rest of your family. And then we can all eat.”

* * *

“Mike, you’re going to wear a hole in the carpet,” Lucas chided. “Sit down for a sec.”

“I can’t help it!” He threw his hands in the air. “She’s just - out there, all alone in the world. She could get hurt!”

Dustin sighed. They’d gone through this three times so far.

“Nancy, Steve, and Jonathan went after her,” Max repeated wearily. “If not the other two, I know for a fact your sister is incredibly capable and can do anything she sets her mind to.”

“We don’t even know where she is!” Mike pointed out. “They’re just going to her mother’s house and _hoping_.”

“Where else could she be?” Dustin demanded, because the answer was that they didn’t know, and that this was getting them nowhere. Yeah, he was anxious about the kid - he was a teacher, he got paid to be anxious about kids - but he was _more_ anxious about Will.

Besides, Dustin always preferred a problem he could solve. And the mysterious science was a bonus. “So let’s make a plan.” As resident scientist (teacher, but still scientist), Dustin felt it was his job to take the lead on what could possibly be a Nobel Prize in the making. “You haven’t been through this portal, but you saw it, right? What’s stuff look like on the other side?”

Mike gave a shiver that Dustin was pretty sure was involuntary. “Wrong,” he started, then fell silent, searching. 

“It’s Hawkins,” Max volunteered, “but it’s not _our_ Hawkins. There are buildings I could recognize, but it was all pretty lifeless.”

Hm. Alternate dimension Hawkins. “Any people?” he asked.

“Not that we saw,” Lucas replied. “Like we said, man, lifeless. The closest thing was like...these dead-looking vine plants that were kind of haphazardly growing in places.”

“There was something in the air,” Mike added finally. “The air feels...wrong, like right before a thunderstorm? And then there’s this white dust floating around everywhere.”

“Don’t breathe that in,” Dustin directed. 

Mike glared at him. “No shit.”

“Just making sure!” Dustin held up his hands placatingly. “And you said the portal changes size?”

“Like it’s alive.” Mike shivered again. “It felt warm and soft. It was gross.”

Dustin nodded and tapped his chin. “Okay. So we need to be careful about it getting too small, which means someone needs to stay with it and watch. I’ve got safety goggles and a respirator mask.”

“How many?” Max asked.

“Just the one,” Dustin answered, “so I’ll go -”

“No way.” Mike crossed his arms. “I’m going.”

“That’s ridiculous, I’m the most equipped -” Dustin began to protest, but Mike cut him off.

“He’s _my_ best friend, _my_ roommate, and it’s _my_ fault he’s gone, and now I lost the kid he wanted me to take care of, the reason he got taken in the first place, so I am going into the freaky alternate dimension and I am _bringing him home_.”

“Mike,” Lucas said softly, reaching out to rub at Mike’s heaving shoulders. “None of this is your fault.”

“ _It is_ ,” he bit back viciously.

“No,” Max said, harsher. “It’s not. You wanna blame someone, blame the lab that took and experimented on kids and ripped open a hole to another universe. If you’re feeling particularly intense about it, you can blame capitalism for making you work midnight shifts at Waffle House just to afford to live.” The others stared, wide-eyed. “What? I’m poor and I have a lot of rage at the system.”

“Yeah, well, he’s my…” and then Dustin trailed off, because what was Will to him, besides the guy he’d been in love with for years? It’s not like he’d ever managed to make a move. It’s not like Will knew Dustin was crazy enough for him that the science wasn’t the most important part of this whole adventure. “He means as much to me as he does to you.”

Mike raised an eyebrow, because he was dense as fuck sometimes and he probably didn’t realize how Dustin felt about Will, but Dustin knew arguing this point wasn’t going to get him anywhere. 

“I need to be able to study this place,” he tried instead.

“Why?” Mike demanded. 

“To see if it did anything to Will! And if the monsters are from that place, then -”

“Dustin.” Max’s voice was like the edge of a knife. “Is this about your everlasting quest to make a major scientific discovery?”

“No!” he protested. Jesus christ, his friends had _no_ faith in him. “Is this a major scientific discovery? Yes! Is that more important than getting Will back? No!”

“Great, so it’s settled. Mike goes in, gets Will, and gets out as fast as possible.” Max smiled triumphantly. “And then we leave the portal _the fuck_ alone.”

“Don’t you have _any_ scientific curiosity?” Dustin groaned.

“I’m a doctor! My whole job is treating people who’ve been exposed to shit they shouldn’t have in places they shouldn’t have been!” 

“Max,” Lucas warned. “Deep breath.”

They blew it out through their nose like a bull. “Right. Yes. The plan. So, goggles, mask - he needs gloves, I do _not_ want him touching anything.”

“Aw, you care about him,” Dustin teased.

Max flushed. “Hello? I _just_ explained my job to you, of _course_ I don’t want him _touching shit_ from an alternate dimension.” They wrinkled their nose. “God, it almost sounds normal at this point.”

“A rope,” Lucas suggested. “We don’t know how big this place is, we should have a path back, like in the minotaur’s maze.”

“Great, I’m Theseus,” Mike grumbled. “At least I’m less of a dick.”

Lucas grinned. “Yeah, if I help you survive this, you better keep your promise to marry me, not dump me on some deserted island.”

Mike’s face went bright red. Dustin couldn’t help but snicker.

“She did marry Dionysus, though,” Max pointed out. “Who’s like, objectively the coolest Greek god.”

“Apollo!” Mike protested. 

“Oh my god, of course you like Apollo,” Max snorted.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Guys! Focus.” Lucas shook his head, like he wasn’t the one who’d started this damn tangent. “So we need protective gear, and to make sure there’s a path back. The place was also pretty dark, so flashlights would be a good idea.”

“A lighter,” Max suggested. The three guys looked at them. “What? It looked like it was covered in dead plants. Bring a lighter in case you need to burn shit. And an axe, maybe.” 

Dustin scribbled those down on the list. “Yeah. Okay. This...seems like a pretty complete list.” He sighed. “Guess it’s time to split up, grab supplies, and then meet at the Waffle House, huh?”

“I can’t believe I work on top of a portal to another dimension,” Mike griped. 

Dustin couldn’t help but agree. It was pretty cool, and Mike didn’t seem appropriately appreciative of the possibilities.

* * *

Jonathan didn’t know why he’d thought going on a road trip with the married couple that he was in love with was a good idea. But it had been Steve who asked him to come along, Steve with that easygoing smile Jonathan could never say no to, and so he was in the backseat of the car trying not to stare at the two of them in the rearview mirror. He was happy to be along on this perfectly normal, friendly road trip.

The radio was also torturing him with Janet Jackson and Whitney Houston, though Jonathan couldn’t help crack a smile - a smile Nancy shared - as Steve hit the high notes in “I Will Always Love You,” even if the man’s music taste was garbage. 

Nancy hit the radio dial when the song finished. “Hey!” Steve protested. 

“You got your pop, let’s take pity on poor Jonathan’s ears,” Nancy laughed. “He always gets to pick, anyway.”

“Yeah, so now it’s my turn.” Steve rolled his eyes, grinning. “It’s not bad, is it, Johnny?”

Steve was the only one who ever called him that. He wasn’t sure how he felt about it, even though he’d had a couple years to decide, but it still got him every time.

Steve took his silence as an answer (which it was, in a way) and gave a very put upon sigh. “ _Fine._ We can listen to your New Wave shit for a while.” His complaints were undercut by the smile, though. 

Steve Harrington never stopped smiling. Jonathan knew for a fact Steve was _happy_ way less often than he smiled, but he always put forth the same cheerful façade, pretending everything was fine. 

Jonathan had seen him cry exactly once, after a blowout fight with Nancy. It’d been about kids, because Karen had said something, and Nancy had reacted far harsher than she’d needed to and Steve had come to Jonathan for support. 

_“I just...really want to be a dad,”_ he’d said, and then given a self-deprecating laugh. _“Of course, Nancy’s right, I’d be a shit dad anyway. This is for the best.”_

That wasn’t what Nancy had said. She’d just been afraid of turning into her mother - or rather, the person her mother used to be. Jonathan had promised him that he’d be a great dad, Holly loved him so much, and he’d gotten a smile for his efforts. 

There had been other fights. Steve and Nancy fought...kind of a lot, over what felt like really stupid things to Jonathan. But Steve always came to Jonathan with a false cheer written on his face and said, “I can’t figure it out, help me see it, man.”

Jonathan had an almost supernatural ability to understand what Nancy was feeling, and could use that to extrapolate her thoughts. He also had the same thing with Steve. Anyone he was close to, really, though in high school it’d been easy to read people around him, just because they were obvious, emotions telegraphed on their faces. 

Steve was never obvious about his emotions - always, always with the smile - but Jonathan could tell anyway. Right now he felt amusement, and playfulness, and worry, and what seemed like a bit of cautious enjoyment.

In time with the guitar riff, Steve’s thumbs were tapping sporadically against the steering wheel, making Jonathan smile. Nancy was humming along, too, but she was chewing on her lip anxiously while she did it, in between bars and disrupting melodies.

“I hope she’s home,” she said as they pulled into the driveway of a small, yellow house. “I just...I have a bad feeling.”

Jonathan nodded. He felt it, too, a sort of jumbled slippery feeling. Like a whirlpool, but turning a bit slower. He was also pretty sure Eleven wasn’t there, but he hoped that was just his natural pessimism that came from growing up in Hawkins, Indiana.

Nancy was up the porch steps before Steve even turned off the engine, and she knocked on the door without waiting for them to follow her. Nervous energy radiated off of her, and it was making Jonathan nervous, too. 

“Relax,” he told her, more as a plea than a comfort.

“Sorry,” she replied, but she didn’t relax.

A blonde woman in her late twenties opened the door. “Hello?” She gazed at them and Jonathan could _feel_ her suspicion. 

That couldn’t be right. Jonathan wasn’t even willing to bet money on this woman being older than him; how could she be the mother of a twelve-year-old? Nancy had made her sound older from the story in the park.

“Hi, I’m looking for Terry Ives?” Nancy greeted, smiling through the nerves that had increased at what was apparently an unfamiliar face. Made sense, then.

The woman pursed her lips. “Why?” she demanded, crossing her arms. 

“We just wanted to talk to her,” Nancy offered placatingly, also noticing the spike of defensiveness.

The woman snorted. “You’ll be sorely disappointed.” She went to start closing the door.

“It’s about her daughter,” Steve tried. 

Jonathan nearly fell over as the woman swung the door back open and _glared_. “What the fuck is wrong with you?” she demanded, looking ready to start swinging at Steve. Jonathan hoped it didn’t come to that - Steve had never been a good fighter.

“Her daughter?” Jonathan repeated, drawing the woman’s attention. At least he could take a hit.

“Her daughter is _dead_ ,” the woman spat. “I don’t know who you are or what game you’re playing, but you can leave me and my sister out of it.”

“Please.” Nancy caught the door in her hand before it could close. “My name is Nancy Wheeler, I met Terry years ago when she was in Hawkins.”

That got the woman - Terry’s sister, apparently - to stop. “ _You’re_ Nancy Wheeler?” she asked disbelievingly. 

“Um. Yes.” Technically she was Nancy Harrington, legally, but she still wrote under her maiden name and she forgot all the time, but it had to be her. “Why?”

The woman sagged. Jonathan could see the fight leaving her. “I’m Becky,” she said. “I guess...why don’t you come inside?”

They all looked at each other, confused, but they followed her inside the house. She had three locks on the door and she did all of them up, and then led them into the kitchen. 

“I don’t have anything to offer you except water,” she said flatly, but they all declined. She poured a glass for herself and sat down at the table heavily. She seemed so much more tired than anyone should be at their age. “So, you’re Nancy Wheeler?” she asked again, mostly rhetorically. “God, you’re young.”

“I’m sorry, I can’t say I know what you were expecting.” Nancy’s smile was tight on her face. She had a very specific kind of frustration that arose from not knowing what the fuck was going on, and it was overflowing. 

Becky didn’t answer her question. Instead, she asked, “If you’re Nancy Wheeler, how are you still - you know.” She gestured up and down. “Healthy?”

“Ma’am,” Jonathan cut in softly before a fight could break out. “What do you know about Nancy?”

“My sister met her when she went and did that _stupid_ study at the lab in Hawkins that they were both a part of. Terry’s letters were always sparse, but she made it sound like Nancy was around the same age as her.”

Nancy grimaced. “I wasn’t a part of the study. I met your sister at the park; she asked where she could rent a room.”

“Oh.” Becky sighed. “Well, I guess that explains why you’re...like this, when she’s not.”

“Can I talk to her, please?” Nancy asked again.

Becky’s response was the same. “You’ll be disappointed.” But now she just sounded sad and tired rather than derisive. “She doesn’t do much talking these days.” That being said, she stood up and led them to a small room off to the side.

The vortex feeling got stronger as Jonathan approached, and coalesced on a woman in a rocking chair staring blankly ahead. He could feel Nancy’s horror.

“What happened?” she asked softly. 

“ _He_ happened,” Becky bit back. “Like I said, her letters were sparse. She couldn’t tell me any of the details of the study, and I’m pretty sure someone was reading her mail. But the scientist in charge, he...and then she was pregnant, and she was so excited, but she miscarried, and then they said she went crazy and they couldn’t treat her so sent my older sister back to me like _this_.”

Terry was mumbling something under her breath that Jonathan couldn’t quite make out.

“She didn’t miscarry,” Nancy said softly. “I’ve met her daughter.” Her daughter who, it was becoming rapidly apparent, was nowhere in this house.

Becky shook her head. “That’s not possible.”

“What else did you know about the study?” Jonathan asked carefully. “Did Terry ever talk about friends?”

“There was a whole bunch of kids,” Becky explained. “She and Nancy - well, I thought - she was the oldest, she said. There was this little Indian girl she took a particular liking to. She said sometimes it felt like being a babysitter.”

“There was a baby born in that lab,” Nancy explained. “The timeline matches perfectly. If Terry was the only one pregnant…”

Becky swallowed. “I mean, it’s possible he did - the same thing to some of the others, but Terry never mentioned it.” She rubbed her hands over her face. “God, this is messed up.”

There was a TV off to the side playing mostly static, but every once in a while, a snatch of _Jeopardy!_ or a daytime soap or some commercial would go through. Steve had wandered over and started playing with the antennae, but absolutely nothing changed. 

Becky waved dismissively. “Don’t bother with that old thing, it’s broken seven ways to Sunday. Terry just likes the noise. She’s calmer with it on, and starts groaning if I turn it off.”

Nancy hummed and knelt down in front of Terry, sorrow evident even as she tried to conceal it. “Hi, Terry,” she said softly. “It’s me, Nancy. The little girl from the park. You remember me and Barb? We told you where to find the motel.”

There was nothing but static, and then the TV flipped to a McDonald’s commercial where some kid asked, “Mom, can I?” and her mother replied, “Yes, of course.” Then it was static again.

Terry didn’t even react to Nancy’s presence. The quiet waiting for a response stretched on until Becky sighed. “I told you.”

“She’s saying something,” Steve pointed out. “I don’t know if it’s in reply to Nancy?”

Terry had given no indication she’d noticed _anyone_ in the room with her, eyes continuing blankly ahead, but Steve was right and her lips were moving. 

Jonathan managed to make out the word “Sunflower,” which wasn’t related, and “Breathe,” and then the same words again. 

“It’s just the same sequence she mumbles all the time,” Becky replied. “They fried her brain with electroshock to try to treat the depression and the delusions.”

“The delusions?” Jonathan asked. 

“She was convinced she didn’t miscarry. Said the Doctor stole her baby. No one believed her. I sure as hell didn’t, but she was already like this when they sent her back to me.” Becky sighed. “Her boyfriend died over in the Middle East, so did dad, and mom couldn’t hack it with a disabled daughter. So it’s just us.” She sighed again, longer and heavier. “She’s not much of a conversationalist, but then, I suppose I’m a jerk too for not believing the story about the kid. Maybe I should’ve - god, I could’ve gone looking for her.”

Steve gave a comforting smile. “I’m sure you did the best you could, considering the circumstances,” he soothed, and Becky’s shoulders relaxed marginally.

Nancy was still knelt at Terry’s feet, looking up at her. “You were right,” she promised. “Your daughter is alive. You were right.”

The woman didn’t move and her face didn’t change, but she breathed, “Jane.” The vortex feeling in Jonathan’s head calmed for a moment before coming back full force.

Becky blinked slowly. “Well, that’s new.”

_“My daughter! My daughter!”_ A woman on the TV was sobbing, but it kept cutting out, and then it dissolved into nothing again.

That was oddly topical, Jonathan reflected.

“So - Jane - was staying with us,” Nancy began, directing this back at Becky while she pushed herself onto her feet again. “Except she ran away this morning. We thought she might have come here, to try to find her mom, but...obviously not.”

When the TV switched this time, Jonathan was already watching. He recognized some newscaster from the Indianapolis station, giving a - the screen went fuzzy for a second - weather report, if Jonathan could read right.

“And up -” the newscaster said, but was interrupted with loud, harsh static that hurt Jonathan’s ears. “-icago.”

“Oh shit.” Becky’s curse drew his attention, and he saw a stream of blood starting down from Terry’s left nostril. “This happens sometimes, I think because of the drugs they had her on.” She snatched a tissue from a cabinet and started dabbing at her sister’s nose. “ _Fucking_ government experiment shit.”

“Why did your sister decide to participate, anyway?” Steve asked. 

Becky rolled her eyes. “Dad was always big on the ‘serve your country’ bullshit, help out whatever way you can. Terry was a hippie, so she wanted nothing to do with the military, and this study was something about ending wars before they even began, so it appealed to her desire to help and her peaceful sensibilities.” 

Jonathan didn’t remark on the irony of an anti-war hippie dating a soldier. It seemed rude. 

Becky seemed to pick up on the thought anyway. She snorted. “I know. He was her high school sweetheart; no idea if they would’ve stayed together if he hadn’t died and she hadn’t...” She gestured over at Terry. “Anyway, I’m sorry I couldn’t be more helpful to you three.” She stopped suddenly. “I never got your names.”

“Steve Harrington and Jonathan Byers,” Steve introduced with his easy smile. “Thank you for what you could offer.”

Becky nodded, shoulders sagging. “Listen, when you find Jane -” She stopped. “I can’t - I hope you didn’t intend to have her live with us, I can barely afford to support me and Terry. But when you find her, I’d really love to meet her, and it’d be nice to have some visits.”

Jonathan hadn’t even thought that far ahead, honestly. He kind of just figured his mom would keep her, in the way that Joyce tended to take care of anything and everything she could. “We will,” he promised. “Thanks for everything.”

She stood at the door and watched them get in the car, waving until they drove off.

“So,” Steve asked, trying to break through some of the disappointed air. “Where to next?”

* * *

_“Jane.”_

Kali heard a voice she hadn’t heard in twelve years, but it wasn’t one she could forget. It was the voice that had soothed her, amused her, loved her for three years. Subject 006, Terry...something. The oldest in their second crop of experiments and Kali’s constant companion. But most importantly…

“Mama?” Jane asked, scrunching up her brows. 

Two sets of five, and then the baby made eleven. The first subject to come entirely from the lab, with no real record. It’d been easy to keep her.

Kali nodded. “Yeah. That’s your mother.” She wasn’t dead, then, which both relieved Kali and made her feel guilty. She’d never gone looking. She’d never tried to find and help her.

Jane’s face screwed up in concentration. “Can’t...remember.”

Luckily, Kali had just the powers for this. “Here.” 

It was easy to remember Terry at 21, with a smile so genuine even after three years of the bullshit they’d put her through, blonde hair done back in a no-nonsense braid, wearing a hospital-issue cotton dress. She was pregnant under the dress, in Kali’s memory, but the lab hadn’t fed them much and Terry hadn’t started to show until very late. She’d had a whole life growing inside her for months without knowing it. 

“This is your mother.” Kali summoned the image, pouring the warmth and love she could recall into it. She tried not to think about the woman, but this message had opened the floodgates. “She would have loved you.”

Jane reached out to touch, but her fingers went straight through the woman’s cheek. Kali was powerful, but at the end of the day it was still an intangible illusion, nothing more. 

She’d spent years wishing otherwise. At this point, she didn’t really have any wishing left.

“Pretty,” Jane said softly, reverently. 

Kali nodded. “Beautiful.” 

The woman had always been beautiful, even after Brenner had strapped her in that _awful_ chair and stolen the light from behind her eyes. But Kali didn’t like to think about her like that; she preferred the Terry that had met her on the first day of the study, held her hand after her so-called parents dropped her off and talked about how exciting it was to be a part of such interesting science. The Terry that had clapped when Kali had created a butterfly out of nothing, not screamed and cursed like the people who’d raised her.

Mick knocked on the doorframe. To call this Kali’s “room” was a bit of a stretch, but it was four walls slightly separated from the main room of the warehouse and it had an old, beat up queen mattress covered in a blanket nest, so it was something. 

“Hey. You okay?” Mick asked softly, inclining her chin in the direction of Kali’s illusion.

Kali nodded, even though she wasn’t entirely sure she was. “Terry called,” she replied.

“Called?” Mick’s look of confusion was justifiable, considering that the warehouse didn’t have a phone and that as far as she knew, Terry had died years ago. It was the reason Kali never talked about her. 

Jane nodded. “Mama called,” she repeated. “To me.”

“Right. Weird psychic brain shit.” Mick shook her head, seeming to take the part where Terry wasn’t dead in stride. “I forget other people have powers like you do, even now.” She came and sat down beside Kali, tucking her chin over Kali’s shoulder.

Kali’s family seemed to think she was the most powerful, unique human alive, which was pretty flattering, if amusingly inaccurate. Only Fun looked at her like the kid she was when he’d found her, powers or no.

“Jane, show Mick what you can do,” Kali directed.

Jane looked around, unsure what demonstration she should make. Finally, she settled on throwing Kali’s blanket towards the wall, except she miscalculated where Kali was standing and wrapped the older girls in a fuzzy prison.

Kali snorted a laugh, untangling Mick and herself, but the look on Jane’s face made the laugh die in her throat. She’d never been all that good at reading emotions - that was always 007’s thing - but Jane hid nothing, broadcasting her terror so clearly Mick noticed too.

“Kali, what the hell?” she hissed under her breath.

“I’m sorry I’m sorry -” Jane was babbling, sobbing, arms wrapped tight around herself.

Kali knew that look. 

“I’m not going to hurt you,” she promised. Then, because she was committed to full transparency, she added, “I only hurt people who deserve it.”

Jane was still shaking, but she breathed long enough to ask, “Bad men?”

Kali nodded. “Bad men. Like Dr. Brenner.”

“Papa,” Jane said with all the fear in her voice that should never describe a parent. Of course he’d made her call him Papa. 

On a technical, biological level, the man was her father, but there was a man named Andrew with eyes like the ocean who told very smart jokes and who Terry was convinced she would go home to, and that - that was Jane’s dad. Or he should have been, anyway.

“I won’t ever let him hurt you again,” Kali promised. “Not Brenner, not anyone.” Fury boiled deep in her gut. “I want to _help_ people.”

“You’re safe here,” Mick added as her own promise. “We fight guys like that.”

“I’m going to kill him.” Everyone around here knew her plan; it only seemed fair that Jane know too, especially considering that he’d ruined her life even more than Kali’s. “I’m going to track Brenner down and I am going to make sure he can’t cause any more damage, ever.”

Jane did not seem as reassured by this as Kali expected.

“...Unless you don’t want me to?” she offered tentatively. Mick’s eyebrows went all the way up; Kali’s quest for vengeance had been the constant fire for the past twelve years. “You are what’s most important. If you don’t want me to go after him, I won’t, and I’ll stay here and take care of you and we’ll never think about him again.”

That was a very stupid thing to say, because she would think about him every day until one of the two of them died. But if Jane wanted her here - well, she owed it to the girl. It was Kali’s fault she’d spent twelve years as a lab rat, that she had all that trauma; if Kali had just been a bit stronger, a bit better, she could have saved the baby.

She wasn’t going to fail twice.

Jane didn’t answer. Kali wasn’t sure what she had thought she’d get, but at least something more conclusive than the small nod that Jane gave.

Axel poked his head into the room. “Dottie managed to scope out the bank and Fun’s got a plan. We’re meeting in ten to get ready.” 

Kali thought about the single mother on 63rd, the homeless folks from this morning, the teenage girl who was saving up to get out of a house where everyone called her a boy. “Come on.” She grinned, something wolfish in it. “I’ll show you how we help people.”

* * *

Will wasn’t sure how many days he’d been in this Upside Down place. It felt like a minute and an eon at the same time. He’d gotten pretty good at dodging the monsters - he’d decided to call them demogorgons because even though they looked nothing like the D&D characters, it made everything feel a little less terrifying - but he didn’t have anything to kill them with, so all he could do was run and duck and hide. 

He hung out around the Waffle House, mostly. It was too unsettling to be at his mom’s place, or the place he shared with Mike; they felt so dead and lifeless. The Waffle House, though, didn’t feel...all that different on this side. 

Not-Mike was there sometimes. He was pretty much Will’s only human company, so far as he could be considered human. He didn’t talk much, and he kept trying to get Will to eat, but he wasn’t too bad to be around. 

He was mostly just really depressed. But that wasn’t too different from the Mike that Will lived with, sad as that made him. He knew Mike was miserable; he knew Mike wasn’t feeling remotely fulfilled. He knew Mike hated the town and his job and everything around him in a way Will had learned to cope with, because this was just...the way it was.

The biggest difference Will tried to focus on was that he could never get Not-Mike to smile; even on the worst of days, he could usually get _something_ out of Mike. It made him feel a little better. And also a million times worse. 

“You’re losing your strength.” Not-Mike poured more coffee into Will’s full mug and the amount of liquid didn’t change at all. “You’re going to start fading, soon. Or you’ll get eaten.” He jutted his chin out to where Will saw a demogorgon in the parking lot. 

They never even tried to get in the Waffle House, which was another reason Will had made this home base.

“Thanks for caring,” Will said, only so he’d hear the same reply he’d gotten the last couple times he’d said it.

“I don’t.”

And the fact that Will could tell he meant it was another big difference from Mike. Mike never admitted to caring about things, but he was a terrible liar. 

“Thanks anyway,” Will said to the empty air where Not-Mike had been. He sighed. 

He liked his Mike better.

In his wanderings around town, he’d never spoken to another Shade. He’d seen what he thought looked like Dustin in the distance and quickly walked the other way; if Mike was breaking his heart, Dustin would be the thing to kill him. He’d also been _pretty_ sure he saw Steve and Nancy screaming at each other, but there wasn’t anything Will wanted to be part of _less_.

He’d also encountered four sets of demogorgons, the largest group of which was three; several of those weird cat things that he was pretty sure was just a demogorgon that hadn’t started walking on two feet yet (Dustin would know, Dustin was the scientist); and a metric fuckton of slugs that were slimy and had teeth and tried to crawl down Will’s throat when he’d had the misfortune of passing out in the woods.

He had not enjoyed that one bit. 

If he had Jonathan’s camera, he’d be taking pictures of everything. As it was, he’d sketched the weird thing in the sky - what the Shades simply called “It” - in blue crayon on the back of a slightly moldy Waffle House kids menu, which was possibly one of the most disgusting things he’d ever done, and was trying to commit _everything_ about this place to memory for when he escaped. 

Because he _was_ going to escape.

As if summoned by the thought, Not-Mike returned, probably to tell him how wrong he was. Except, he realized, this one was crashing through the front door with a rope around his waist and screaming “Will!” with far too much emotion to be the Shade.

“Mike?” he asked, not quite believing his eyes.

“Oh thank fucking god,” Mike practically sobbed. “Will, we’re here to take you home.”

“We?” he asked, glancing around.

“Everyone else is on the other side. Dustin’s really anxious to see you.”

Will cracked a smile. “I’m anxious to see him.” He didn’t ask who else ‘everyone’ entailed, because he was pretty sure he didn’t want to know if his mother was out there until he could see her with his own two eyes. 

“Come on.” Mike grabbed his hand and dragged him out of the Waffle House before Will could protest, around and down into the storm cellar in the back. 

There was nothing there. 

“Oh come on,” Mike protested, “I swear it was right here -”

“Mike,” Will interrupted gently. “I assume the rope on your waist has something to do with getting home?” 

Mike glanced down, took a deep breath, and then let it out slowly. “Yes. You’re right.” He turned around and began following his trail home, Will keeping pace. “Sorry, man, it’s been a weird three days.”

Huh. Three days. Somehow it felt like much longer and much shorter than that.

Will craned his neck, but the demogorgon he’d seen in the parking lot was gone. “Did you encounter any of the monsters?” he asked.

“Monsters?” Mike shook his head. “No, they must be asleep or something.”

Will _highly_ doubted that, but he didn’t want to argue. He hoped Mike was right, anyway. “How’s the kid?” he asked suddenly. Mike winced guiltily, which Will did not like at all. “What?”

He sighed. “She ran away.”

“ _Mike!_ ”

“I know! Nancy, Steve, and Jonathan are going to get her.”

“From _where_?”

“We found her mom,” Mike replied. “We think.” He glanced back at Will. “Yeah, there’s a whole government conspiracy thing happening here.”

Will blinked. “I did not - okay, wait, hold on, how did we get from Mothers to Weird Government Conspiracies?” He could follow _his_ mother and the weird government conspiracies, that was a very Joyce situation to get into, but not mothers in general. 

The rope led them towards the center of town, farther away from the Waffle House. Will wanted to ask if Mike saw the Shadow Thing in the sky, but he didn’t have a chance.

“Her mom? From the Lab?” Mike glanced back at him.

Will shook his head. “All I know is there’s some weird paranormal alternate universe stuff happening here,” he replied. “Which I am dying to ask Dustin about.”

Mike gave an offended huff. “I could explain it,” he mumbled.

“Tell me about the lab,” Will directed instead. He was a bit too tired to deal with all the emotional nonsense there.

Mike ran through the important bits, the existence of Dr. Brenner and MKUltra and weird psychic humans. 

“Wait, hold on. The girl has powers?”

“Telekinesis,” Mike clarified. “And she knows about…” He waved his hands around. “This place.”

“The Upside Down,” Will replied. 

“The Upside Down?”

Oh, he was going to have to explain that at some point. “Yeah, that’s what I’ve been calling it.” Not now, though.

Mike took another step forward, towards the library, and then he was gone. Will didn’t consider himself one to panic, but he would admit that his heart skipped a couple beats there. Still, he stepped forward, and then he was somewhere dark and dank, a pair of arms around him.

“Will!”

He smiled in spite of himself. “Hi, Dustin.” 

The arms got tighter and curls brushed his cheek. “Hi, Will,” the other man croaked. 

“Guys, can we please get out of the cellar?” asked a voice Will hadn’t heard in awhile. 

“Agreed,” chimed in a second. “It’s damp and it smells like death.”

Will couldn’t smell anything, but then, it probably smelled like the Upside Down - ozone and burnt rubber and leaf rot - which he’d gotten used to a while ago. 

In the daylight - and god it was wonderful to see a _blue_ sky - Will took stock of Mike and Dustin, and their two companions, Lucas and Max. It’d been a little while since he’d seen them, but he’d recognize them anywhere. 

He’d known Lucas was coming to visit soon, he’d just forgotten. “Sorry you had to spend your free time rescuing me from an alternate dimension,” he offered with a sheepish smile. 

Lucas rolled his eyes. “Man, shut up.” He pulled Will in for a hug. “I’m just glad you’re okay.”

“Tell me _everything_ ,” Dustin demanded. “This is the scientific discovery of the century!”

Will laughed, charmed as always. “Sure. But I want to see my mom first, she’s probably worried.”

“Oh, shit!” The four boys turned to glance at Max to see why they’d sworn. “They told us you were dead!” 

“Shit, yeah.” Lucas nodded. “We need to go tell Joyce everything is okay.”

“Home it is, then!” Dustin declared. 

Will rode shotgun in Dustin’s car, and Lucas and Mike were in the other. It’d been a struggle to convince Mike to let Will out of his sight, but not as big of a struggle as he’d expected, and Will had a feeling that was all Lucas’ doing. Max didn’t ride with either - they were on their motorcycle, which Will had always thought was pretty cool.

“I did all your grading for you,” Dustin said, pulling out of the Waffle House parking lot. The building was closed, which was how Will knew it was really bad, because he couldn’t remember if it had ever closed before in his life. “I mean, some of it’s subjective, so you should check it all, and I know it was just one day, but I didn’t want you to fall behind.”

Will’s heart warmed. “Thanks, Dustin. I really appreciate it.” He patted the back of Dustin’s hand on the stick shift.

Dustin flushed, grinning. “Yeah. Yeah, no problem.”

“So who said I was dead?” Will asked, because he was morbidly curious. 

“State Police, allegedly.” Dustin harrumphed with obvious offense. “Nobody came to tell _me_ , though, that’s just what I heard from Mike and your mom. Said they found your body out by the quarry. That you jumped.” He looked at Will out of the corner of his eye.

Will snorted. “Life’s not _that_ bad in Hawkins,” he quipped, mostly because he didn’t want to acknowledge the uncomfortable feeling that story gave him. The fact it got Dustin to smile was another plus. 

“Exactly.” Dustin grinned. Will could sense his relief. “I mean, after all, I’m here.”

Will laughed. “Yeah, you are.” They shared a smile.

One of these days he was going to stop dancing around his feelings for Dustin. It would be better to get it all out there and talk about it; it was worth the risk. He just wasn’t going to do it today, not after everything. 

Dustin hovered behind him and ushered Will into his mom’s house. Instantly, Joyce was on her feet and had her arms around Will’s shoulders, crying.

Small feet came running down the hall. For a brief second, Will hoped, and then he tried not to feel disappointed when it was Holly shouting “Will!” He was glad to see his little sister, he was just really worried about the girl. He’d really been hoping. 

“Joyce? Honey?” And there was Karen Wheeler, on cue, entering the room. Will wasn’t sure what she’d been holding - his view was full of his mother’s dark curls - but he did hear it when it hit the ground. “ _Will?_ ”

“The reports of his death were greatly exaggerated,” Dustin quipped, because even a science teacher could hardly resist a Mark Twain joke when it was so applicable. Also because no one liked Joyce crying, so the hiccupy laugh it got out of her was worth everything.

“Hi, Mom,” Will said softly, petting her hair. One of the weirdest parts of growing up had been gaining a good seven inches on his mother, a fact he’d never been more aware of than as she shook against him. 

The door opened again, and closed, and Karen rushed forward, meaning Mike must’ve been back with Lucas and probably Max. Holly abandoned Will’s torso in favor of hugging Mike, but Joyce still held on like her life depended on it. 

“I knew it,” she said softly, over and over. “I knew you weren’t gone.”

In the end, it was Will leading his mother over to the couch and sitting the both of them down. Karen brought some tissues and two cups of tea, but she kept looking at Will like he was a ghost, and she wouldn’t stay in his line of sight.

“Where’s the Chief?” Will heard Mike ask his mother in a low voice. 

“He went to see the body,” she whispered back.

Will wondered who was on the slab instead of him. He hoped Hopper could identify the body for some other poor family that lost a member to the quarry. 

“Where did you go?” Joyce asked, drawing his attention back. “I knew you weren’t dead but you weren’t...here, either.”

“What do you mean?” Will asked. 

“I can always feel you boys somewhere. Holly, too, if I concentrate.” Joyce tapped her heart. “I can still feel Jonathan, but he’s far. He’s in Indianapolis looking for the little girl.” She beamed at him. “I heard you protected her.”

Will nodded. “So if you can feel us, why was I different?”

“It was like you were on the other side of a wall,” Joyce replied, spreading her hands. “A wall I’ve never even felt before. I didn’t know it was there until I looked and you were on the other side of it.”

She’d talked about it, sometimes, the way she could feel her kids, but Will had always just considered it a mother’s intuition. In light of recent events…

The door banged open. “Joyce, I’m so sorry -” Hopper stopped dead.

Will waved. “Hi, Chief.” There was no reason for it to feel as awkward as it did, and yet Will couldn’t help but squirm.

“You’re dead,” Hopper replied.

“Clearly not,” Joyce said with an air of ‘I told you so.’

“No, you don’t understand; I saw _your body,_ ” Hopper insisted. “A little blue in the lips, waterlogged, but clearly you. Beauty mark on your shoulder and everything.”

Will didn’t want to think too hard about how Hopper could identify him by his beauty marks. That was...a little much for tonight. 

“Well, I’m alive,” Will finally said. 

It was Max who posed the next question. “So who the hell faked your death? To the point where they had a body that looked so much like you that your mom’s” - they broke off, unsure, and changed tracks - “that the Chief of Police was fooled?”

Will shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“It’s obviously the lab.” Dustin rolled his eyes. “C’mon, guys, everything has to be connected. Weird alternate dimension, psychic powers, government experiments...one of their experiments took out Will and they needed to cover it up.” He said it like it was obvious. Will supposed it was, when you thought about it like that. 

He stood up. “I want to go home and sleep in my bed. We can figure all this” - he waved his hands - “out in the morning.”

Mike was by his side in an instant. “We’ll see you all tomorrow, then,” he said and practically dragged Will out the door. 

Once outside in the chilly moonlight, Mike caught him in another bone-crushing hug. “Don’t ever do that again,” he sniffled. 

“I didn’t mean to do it the first time,” Will replied, squeezing him back. “Hey, I’m okay.”

“You’re my best friend, I _can’t_ lose you.”

“You won’t,” Will promised, and he meant it, even though one could argue he had no idea if he’d die or not. “Besides, after this, we’ll have some cool new ideas for the comic book, huh?”

Mike did not seem convinced, but he let Will lead him back to the car. He didn’t even protest when Will took the keys and started the drive home.


	5. That's a Fuckin' Weird Cat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warnings for this chapter include: a scene of a car accident, mild gore with the death of Mews, intense homophobia, transphobia, and racism from Neil Hargrove including slurs such as "f*g" and "d*ke", domestic abuse, Kali commits revenge murder and it is not particularly merciful

Dustin watched Mike and Will drive off and told himself firmly that he wasn’t jealous. He never wanted to let Will out of his sight again, but that was ridiculous, and he should have been totally okay thinking about Will going home.

So because he was totally okay with Will going home and wasn’t worried about anything, Dustin decided that now was the time for science.

There was also still plenty of daylight, which meant that this was totally a safe and reasonable endeavor. Did Dustin _want_ to be doing science alone? Of course not. His favorite experiments had Will at his side, or at least someone to witness and help. But everyone else was busy, and besides, he knew exactly what they’d say.

Dustin pulled into the Waffle House parking lot and considered how unsettling it was to see the building closed. The power was still out, even though it had already come back in the rest of town. He wanted to know _why_. He wanted to know what the hell was growing on the generator in the cellar. 

Simply put, Dustin wanted to know everything.

The recently discarded rubber gloves and safety goggles were dragged out again, this time placed by Dustin on himself with no one for assistance. Not that he needed assistance, because he was a science teacher and he could absolutely put on a pair of safety goggles and dish gloves.

God, he missed Will.

But anyway, science, he reminded himself, wielding a disposable camera he’d purchased explicitly for this moment. It was time. 

Because he was by himself, he’d anchored his rope to the overgrown generator. Mike had said the gate wasn’t in the same place on the other side, so Dustin was taking no chances. A good scientist was prepared. 

He pushed his way through the gate, confused and awed at how it felt _alive_. He clicked the button on his tape recorder and made a note of it, and then he was on the other side. 

“The air smells like sulfur,” he continued, glancing around. “There’s some sort of dust - maybe spores? - floating everywhere. Everything is covered in plant life, so spores seem likely. The sky is grey and cloudy, but uniformly so, except where there’s a large - uh, shadow, I guess? It’s vaguely shaped like Cthulhu, with the tentacles and shit.”

Okay, not the most scientific description he could’ve given, but still.

The more he looked at it, the less describable the thing in the sky seemed. It had - well, his earlier assessment of tentacles seemed correct, or perhaps legs like a giant spider, but Dustin couldn’t see them touching the ground _anywhere_ , even though they had to. Probably. Logically. The thing didn’t have wings or anything to indicate that it should be capable of flying. 

This scientific adventure would be more fun if he had someone to speak to besides his tape recorder, Dustin couldn’t help but think.

He saw some things in the distance, vaguely humanoid but too large with long arms and a weirdly shaped head. 

“I believe I have encountered the monster Eleven was referring to,” Dustin said quietly, creeping forward. “They’re difficult to see at this distance, but my preliminary assessment is as follows…”

Every once in a while, he was convinced he saw a person out of the corner of his eye, sometimes even people he knew. He saw Lucas at one point, but by the time he whipped around to demand what Lucas was doing here, the man was gone. 

“I seem to be experiencing some sort of hallucinations,” he mused. “Maybe caused by the spores in the air? Remind me to take samples when I get home.”

He found Mike’s Waffle House; weirdly enough, it looked much the same. The vines were still crawling on the outside, but the lighting inside matched the atmosphere and Dustin’s memories at the same time. It was flickering, on and off, and when it was off, Dustin saw his reflection in the glass of the window, but distorted. 

Something seemed wrong and made him profoundly uncomfortable as he looked into what logically were his own eyes. Just because that was logical, however, didn’t actually convince him of it. There was a moment where he would swear his reflection blinked a good thirty seconds after he did.

Dustin hurried away, but he did not make a note of it, because experienced scientists did _not_ get the heebie-jeebies.

Dustin glanced down at his watch to see how long he’d been in this place. It was a nice watch, scientific and expensive with a little compass spinning wild. The second hand was going backwards.

“What the fuck,” he demanded, still hushed. Then, because he’d technically already started the note, he continued. “The second hand on my watch is traveling in the opposite direction, and the compass cannot find true North no matter how it tries.” He tapped on the face, but it made no difference. 

Since he had no idea how long he’d been here, it was probably a good idea to start heading back before anyone could miss him. Except as he followed the rope, he felt it tugging him to the side, away from where it was disappearing into the fog.

He tripped and landed on his knees with an _oof_. The tape recorder skittered away.

Something yowled.

At first glance, it was a cat. At second, it was the world’s most fucked up cat. It didn’t have a face, just a toothy little hole at the end of its snout, and its whole body was soft and slimy. 

In other words, it was perfect. 

“Hi there,” Dustin cooed. “My name’s Dustin. I’m a scientist. Are you hungry, friend? Here.”

He dug through one of his many pockets and found one half-finished bag of beef jerky. He wasn’t sure how old it was, but he hoped this thing wouldn’t mind.

In retrospect, attempting to feed it by hand wasn’t the smartest thing Dustin had ever done. But at least he was wearing the rubber gloves, so when the thing caught his finger with its teeth, it just ripped a hole in the rubber, not in Dustin.

“I’m gonna call you D’Artagnan,” he decided. “Alright, D’Art, follow me.”

Technically, D’Art was an example of biology. However, he was part of the larger system - a whole freakin’ parallel universe - that was gonna land Dustin the Nobel Prize for Physics. Without a doubt.

Speaking of which. He patted around on the ground, searching for his tape recorder. It couldn’t have gone far, yet somehow, he couldn’t see it anywhere.

“Motherfucker,” he mumbled, because his audio notes were very important to this scientific investigation. “Where the fuck did you go?”

D’Art butted his head against Dustin’s hand while Dustin looked, and the man absently patted the thing. Its head was soft and slimy - no skull to speak of, so far as Dustin felt - and absolutely nothing like a cat. Man, that first impression had been _really_ wrong.

“Ah ha!” he declared as he found the tape recorder a little ways back. Mathematically speaking, there was no possible way the recorder could’ve flown from his hand to that location, considering the angle and velocity as Dustin tripped, but his watch was already losing its goddamn mind, so it seemed silly to try to apply the laws of physics as he knew it to this place. 

_God_ , he was so excited.

He tucked the tape recorder firmly back into his pocket and began herding D’Artagnan back along the rope, towards the portal that just sort of floated in the middle of the street. In the middle of town. He couldn’t see the Waffle House cellar, but he patted around until his hand hit air that was slightly squishier than it should be and managed to push himself back through. 

“C’mon, D’Art,” he said again, fashioning the now-unnecessary navigation rope into a leash and slipping it over the monster’s head. “Let’s go home.”

* * *

Nancy used a payphone outside the diner to call Mike’s house with every intention to update him. But when he picked up, he didn’t let her get a word in edgewise. 

“Will’s back.”

“I thought -” Nancy’s brow creased. The boy was supposed to be dead. 

“Yeah, I know. Look, we can’t talk on the phone, we’re being listened to.”

Nancy raised one eyebrow. “Oooookay.” She waited for him to elaborate. It wasn’t like she’d never heard that one before, just never from Mike.

“Government conspiracies, Nance, of course there’s a wiretap involved!” He gave an exasperated huff.

She rolled her eyes, but he did have a point. “Fine. The basket is still empty, but we’re not coming home yet.”

Mike grumbled and accepted her coded message. “Thanks,” he replied, and before she could say anything else, he’d hung up. 

“Ordered for you, babe,” Steve told her as she slid into the red-and-white vinyl of the booth, taking her spot next to him. “What’d your brother say?”

She rolled her eyes, unhappy to have so little news. “Shockingly little. He doesn’t want us talking on the phone because he thinks it’s tapped.”

Steve laughed. “That’s ridiculous.” He glanced back and forth between Jonathan and Nancy’s faces and his laughter tapered off. “What, you really think the US government is spying on its own citizens?”

Nancy just kept staring at him. He was pretty, but he was rather naive. “I mean...yeah?” she said finally. “Probably, all things considered.”

“But the government -” Steve stopped mid-sentence, mouth clicking shut. “Okay, you know what, after reading about those experiments I don’t know if there’s anything worth trusting them about.”

Jonathan offered a small smile that made Nancy’s whole body warm. “‘Atta boy, Steve,” he teased. “You’re becoming a real rebel.”

“Will’s back,” Nancy told him, because she didn’t know how to soften the blow so putting it on the heels of a joke seemed as good of a method as any. 

“What?” Jonathan demanded, meal laying untouched. “He’s - they said he was dead.” He was caught between confusion and hope, and perhaps this hadn’t been as good of a method as any after all.` `

“Apparently not.” Nancy shrugged helplessly. She had never claimed to be good at social situations; it was better to get to the point, in her opinion, and this was the point. “He’s with Mike now. Seems like your mom was right.”

Jonathan groaned. “God, I owe her an apology. So does Hopper,” he added with a frown. “Which he better give.”

Steve patted Jonathan’s hand across the table. “I’m sure he will, bud. You know how much he loves your mom.”

Jonathan winced. “Don’t say it like _that_.”

“Like what?” Steve demanded. “He’s totally in love with her.”

“Steve,” Nancy said gently, then paused as the waiter delivered them their meals. When he’d left, she continued, “You do know that my mother and Joyce are...involved, don’t you?”

“You mean like...lesbians?” Steve looked dumbfounded, but he recovered quickly. “I didn’t. But that doesn’t mean Hopper doesn’t love her, it’s so obvious.”

“My mom’s bisexual, but yes, like that,” Jonathan replied. 

“Good for her.” Steve smiled awkwardly and shrugged. Nancy was torn between wanting to shake him and wanting to kiss him. “But I mean, just because two people are together, doesn’t mean that someone else can’t love them.”

The air filled with tension like ice cracking over a frozen lake; she felt just as cold, and none of them moved.

Did he know?

A flare of guilt lit up her insides, but Steve was still smiling awkwardly, determinedly, and maybe...maybe he was telling Jonathan that he knew, but that he trusted him, and that their friendship was most important.

She wasn’t sure he’d feel the same way if he realized Nancy loved Jonathan, too.

Nancy coughed, breaking the moment. “So, yeah, I don’t know the details, but Mike said he’s home and he’s fine.”

Jonathan buried his face in his hands. “God. I didn’t believe her and now Will’s back without me and we didn’t find the girl and we didn’t succeed at anything.”

“Hey, we’re not done yet!” Steve heartened, reaching over to pat Jonathan’s arm again. 

Nancy nodded, never one to admit defeat. It was one of the reasons she loved Steve. “Where do we go next?” she asked, stealing one of Steve’s fries even though she had her own.

He just rolled his eyes at her and smiled. “She mentioned having a sister,” he pointed out, staying on topic. “But Terry didn’t have any other kids.”

Nancy nodded slowly. “Which means the sister is probably another test subject. Maybe the Indian girl Becky mentioned?” She chewed a fry pensively. “Did we find anything else in the newspapers?”

“Jonathan, bud, you’ve gotta eat.” Steve nudged the plate into the other man’s arm. “Uh, no, I don’t remember any other names.”

Jonathan shook his head. “Me neither.” He took a small, tentative bite of his burger and Steve smiled at him like he’d hung the sun.

Nancy loved this. She loved working as a team with both of them, all three of them out and eating and chatting and trying. She wished they could do this in Hawkins without the threat of emergency. But of course people would talk.

“How late do you think the library’s open?” Nancy asked speculatively.

Steve sighed and rolled his eyes. “Late enough that you can let Jonathan actually eat his burger,” he scolded. “But yes, honey, that’s a great idea.”

Nancy felt only a little bit cowed. She couldn’t help it, she was eager. “Sorry.”

Yet as fast as she wanted to get to the bottom of this case, she didn’t want the moments like this to end.

* * *

Will had been relieved to sleep in an actual bed instead of the ground or a Waffle House booth, and extra relieved to wear clean pajamas. He’d locked his windows and door, pulled his curtains tight, and burrowed under his mountain of blankets the minute he’d gotten home, and then he’d passed out into dreamless, lifeless sleep. 

What woke him was Mike banging on his door, slightly frantic. “Will?”

Will scrambled out of bed. “I’m up, I’m up,” he grumbled, tossing open the door. “What is it?”

“Sorry.” Mike looked sheepish, hands shoved in his pockets. “I’ve been knocking for five minutes, man.”

Will didn’t think he’d ever slept that deeply in his life. “Sorry.”

“It’s fine, you need to sleep. I just - I got freaked out.” Mike glanced away, embarrassed. 

Will reached out to squeeze his shoulder. “Hey, I get it,” he soothed. “I’m freaked out, too.”

“Well, of course,” Mike replied. “You were actually there. Of course you’re freaked out.” He had his arms wrapped tight around himself, not quite looking at Will but not quite looking away, either.

Will shrugged. “You were missing me. That’s scary, too.” He neglected to mention that at least he’d had some facsimile of Mike with him, that if he pretended hard enough it almost helped the loneliness. It seemed cruel. “So why are you waking me? What’s up?”

Mike startled like he’d completely forgotten. “Oh, shit. Uh, Hawkins Power & Energy is here, they’re looking around because of the recent outages.”

Will’s eyebrows climbed. “At this time of morning?” It was 6am. “Oh, I should start getting ready for school.” It was a little early, but he was up anyway. 

“You’re not seriously going in to work, are you?” Mike looked flabbergasted. 

“I mean, it’s Monday.” Will shrugged, heading over to rifle through his closet. “What else would I do?”

“I dunno, stay home to recover from the fact you spent several days in a parallel dimension?”

Will glanced over. “You probably shouldn’t shout that when there are people in the house,” he pointed out. “And I’d rather go back. It’ll help me feel like things are normal.”

What he really wanted was to sit in his classroom, sketch some of what he’d seen, and engage in a long conversation with Dustin about the science of the whole thing, but he wanted to see his kids, too.

He made it to the kitchen and started brewing a pot of coffee, and he made eye contact with one of the workers through the kitchen window. The man looked like he’d seen a ghost and seemed to fumble whatever he was holding as he ripped his gaze away from Will. 

Well, that was weird.

He wondered if news of his death had spread. His mother hadn’t believed it and everyone else had been too busy, so he couldn’t imagine it getting far. Still, this guy looked like he _knew_.

“How long have they been here?” he asked Mike, who’d followed him to the kitchen. 

“Not long,” Mike replied. “Just reading the meters and stuff. They promised they wouldn’t get in the way, were real apologetic. I told them they should check out the generator in the Waffle House cellar.”

Will raised his eyebrows. “You sent them to the portal?”

“Nah, the guy said it was already on their list. Confounding them, too. They can’t figure out what’s wrong with the wiring, why the power won’t come back.”

“Huh.” Will started pouring coffee into his travel mug. On the one hand, he should be relieved that no one else had stumbled onto that portal. On the other, he just couldn’t understand how anyone could investigate the electricity at the Waffle House without realizing something was seriously wrong. At best, it was lazy and negligent. 

Mike rubbed at his eyes. “I’m really not used to a diurnal life,” he complained. “My body’s been really mad about me trying to go to bed before 4am.”

Will laughed. “Welcome to my world. I used to pray for the day I graduated so I could stop waking up early. Now I work at the middle school.”

Mike knew that. At this point, there wasn’t really anything they didn’t know about each other, no secrets between them. In fact, Will was pretty sure he sometimes knew things Mike didn’t even know about himself. Yet the routine, to say these things and know these things and bridge the space between them, brought him comfort on a normal day.

And today definitely wasn’t a normal day.

“You gonna be okay if I take the car?” Will asked while he toasted a bagel. “Since you’re actually awake during the day.”

Mike nodded. “Yeah, I’ll just call Lucas if I need to go somewhere.” His face turned bright red and Will chuckled to himself. Ah, they were back to high school, it seemed.

“Cool. See you tonight.” He grabbed his coat and his breakfast on the way out, and only felt a little bit guilty about leaving Mike behind today. 

There were three guys around the side of the house who all hurriedly looked away when he glanced at them. They were close to a couple patches of dead grass and what looked like it might’ve been blood, but that was ridiculous because Mike said it had rained, there was no way the girl’s blood was still on the grass.

Eleven, her name was. Will hoped she was doing okay. He didn’t like to think about her out there all alone - she was the same age as his kids, they were all _babies_ and they needed to be looked out for. 

He hoped Jonathan brought her home. Jonathan was good with kids; even if she didn’t want to come back, he could talk her into it. 

Maybe she was safer away from Hawkins, though. 

The engine turned over twice, but it did start. His headlights cut a sallow beam through the dawn and he pulled off towards the road. For now, he would worry about the twelve-year-olds in his care.

* * *

The mood in the car was tense. Jonathan was not a fan. 

_“I mean, just because two people are together, doesn’t mean that someone else can’t love them.”_

Steve’s words kept rattling around in his head, and neither Nancy nor Steve was talking now to distract him. The radio was on, playing some song by Toni Braxton (who he only knew because Steve loved her); it was a love song and it _really_ wasn’t helping. Steve hadn’t offered to let Jonathan pick this time, not that Jonathan had expected him to.

Nancy had refused to grab a motel room, so they had all driven back through the night, stopping at a gas station around two a.m. and existing in tense silence.

If they’d found something at the library, he would have something to break the silence with. Then again, if they’d found something at the library, Nancy wouldn’t be this pissed off, and because Nancy wasn’t upset, Steve wouldn’t be, either. 

And Jonathan would have something to think about besides the way he had been directly called out about the fact he was in love with his best friend’s wife.

Steve hadn’t always been his best friend. In fact, when they were younger, Steve had bullied him relentlessly. But Nancy Wheeler was a force to be reckoned with, and when she started dating Steve, she set him on the path to being a more respectful and bearable individual. 

Then there was The Fight sophomore year. Tommy and Carol were not a fan of the new and improved Steve, and the fact that hanging out with Nancy meant hanging out with Jonathan, because Nancy was his only friend and their moms were close (retrospectively hilarious) and so were their brothers. So it came time to choose between his old friends, the ones he’d grown up with and done everything with, or his girlfriend and her reluctant unpopular hanger-on, and much to everyone’s shock - none more than Jonathan - Steve chose them.

And now he was in love with the guy, because Jonathan was incapable of making things easy for himself.

Steve _and_ Nancy. It had always been Nancy, always, since he saw her wearing an elf costume for their brother’s D&D game and she let him take her picture and he told himself he was going to marry her. Except he hadn’t, Steve had, but by the time they got there Jonathan had fallen for the new and improved Steve Harrington, and as he stood beside Steve at the altar as his Best Man, he’d felt a mix of bitterness and happiness and confusion because he had been so, so wrong.

_“If anyone has any reason these two should not be wed…”_

He’d bit his tongue so hard it bled. They were getting married and they wouldn’t need him anymore and they’d leave him behind, but that was okay, that was how it was _supposed_ to happen. 

And then it hadn’t happened like that, and Jonathan fell a little bit more in love every day, and he listened and gave advice whenever Nancy or Steve asked and tried to ease the feelings of unhappiness he saw, and made peace with the close-but-not-quite way he was with them.

His internal monologuing was cut short by the force of impact and the sound of crunching metal. 

“ _Fuck_!” Nancy shouted as her head connected with the side of the car, and it was only because of who she was that her voice was louder than the impact. The airbag blew and the windshield shattered in front of her, scattering little cuts all over her face. 

Steve’s cheek was cut up and he was winded, but he seemed fine, and Jonathan found himself in the same boat. 

“What the hell?” he breathed.

“I think I hit a deer,” Steve said, blinking slowly. “I don’t know, it just - it ran out in front of me -”

“We should probably look,” Jonathan suggested gently. 

Steve nodded. “Yeah. Right.” 

He and Steve climbed out of the car to investigate. Nancy climbed out the other side, much to their chagrin, wobbling slightly. 

“That’s a fucking weird cat,” Steve said finally, after they’d stared for several hopeless minutes trying to categorize the thing. 

Nancy scoffed. “It’s not a fucking _cat_ , you dumbass.” Her irritation nearly bowled Jonathan over.

“I mean, it looks kind of like a mountain lion -” Steve tried, but Jonathan could tell he wasn’t even convincing himself.

It looked like a mountain lion except for the part where it didn’t have a face besides a mouth absolutely _filled_ with razor-sharp teeth.

Jonathan was less concerned with what it was than he was if it was dead. It was immobile, but…

It didn’t _feel_ dead to him, whatever the hell that was supposed to mean.

Also, he wasn’t a scientist by any means, but the size of the thing did not seem proportional to the damage the crash caused. It was smaller than a deer, and it didn’t have antlers, but the car was still in bad shape. 

Nancy reached out with her foot and frustratedly poked at the tiny corpse. It made a squelching noise, ungodly, but otherwise remained as it was. 

“Mountain Lions don’t _squelch_ ,” she informed Steve definitively, crossing her arms. If it wasn’t such a stressful situation, that sentence probably would’ve made all three of them bust out laughing, but - 

The _thing_ made a broken sound, half growl and half moan, and staggered to its feet, then took off into the night, brushing right past Jonathan as it went. 

“Jesus!” Steve swore. “Did that just -”

“Yeah.” Jonathan stared after it. Guess he was right. 

Nancy took a staggering step in the direction the monster had gone. “We can’t just let it get away,” she protested. “It’s obviously connected somehow.” Her body had other thoughts, however, because her legs buckled underneath her just in time for Jonathan to catch her before she hit the ground.

“Thanks, man,” Steve breathed in relief. “Nancy, baby, you’re hurt, we need to take you home.”

“I’m not,” she protested, still leaning heavily against Jonathan. 

When Nancy lied, she felt a very specific sort of way to Jonathan. He couldn’t describe the feeling at all, but he was definitely getting it now.

“You’re not,” he replied. He reached down and picked her up into a bridal carry. “Let’s go home.”

It was easy to say ‘home,’ to forget that it was _their_ home and not his, but she only smacked his chest once in frustration and slumped against him, defeated. She went easy as a ragdoll as he slid her into the back seat and buckled her up tight. 

“Thank you,” Steve said again when the two of them had gotten situated up front. Jonathan wasn’t sure if it was safe to be there, with the bits of windshield and the deflated airbag, but Nancy was laid down across the backseats and there wasn’t room. 

Steve eyed her warily in the rearview mirror, broadcasting his concern. “I don’t know what we’d do without you.”

Jonathan shrugged. “You’d be fine.”

Steve shook his head with overwhelming conviction. “We really wouldn’t.” He caught Jonathan’s eye. “She never listens to me like she listens to you. You two understand each other, and you get her in a way I never will. But you help - you help to translate me, too, into something she can understand.”

Jonathan’s face felt hot.

“Of course, man,” he said, not knowing what else. “I mean, you’re my best friend.”

Steve nodded, and something like bittersweet sadness prickled at the edges of him. “Yeah. Best friends.”

Nancy had fallen asleep in the back seat, startling when Steve reached back to pat her knee. “Huh?”

“I think you’ve got a concussion, sweetheart,” Steve said, and Jonathan remembered the short collection of concussions the guy had accrued in high school. “I need you to stay awake for us, okay?”

Nancy made a distraught noise. “I’m tired,” she whined. “It’s too early.”

“I know, baby, I know, but we’ll be home soon, and Jonathan will check you out and then you can sleep as much as you want, okay?” Steve promised. 

Unlike Nancy, Steve was easier to describe: he felt like honey when he lied, warm and thick and coating Jonathan, making him want to believe anything Steve said, even when he knew it wasn’t true.

“What are you going to do?” Jonathan asked quietly. 

“It’s almost early enough in the morning that the auto shop will be open,” Steve replied. “I’m going to take the car in and see what they can do about it. Maybe - see if they know what could have caused this kind of damage,” he added, but he didn’t sound convinced. 

The little girl had been talking about monsters. Maybe this was one of them. 

Jonathan suggested as much, but Steve shook his head. “Nah, man, it’s like - a metaphor.” He took one hand off the wheel to gesture grandly. “Kids don’t _really_ mean it when they say there are monsters.”

He sounded like he was trying to convince himself more than anyone else.

Jonathan said nothing, just stared straight ahead and watched the few lights of town refract through the shattered windshield as they approached. For the first time, he didn’t quite recognize the place he’d grown up as they drove back towards it.

* * *

One could argue, perhaps, that it was not the smartest idea to enter an alternate dimension and to bring back a living organism. 

Dustin was finding that argument increasingly difficult to disagree with as he searched his room frantically. He’d come to the conclusion D’Art wasn’t there about a minute and a half ago, but he was really holding out hope that the little guy had made a home amongst the detritus at the bottom of his closet. 

Retrospectively, Dustin knew he should have acquired something sturdier than a plastic bin to hold the thing over night. Of course he should have, it was obvious. But goddammit, he’d been tired, so he’d grabbed a bin to use like a cage and he’d said “Stay” and he’d hoped for the best. 

Dustin Henderson was not a particularly lucky man.

When he was younger, he’d had Will, Mike, and Lucas over for a sleepover. Lucas insisted it was super weird to sleep with the door open, and Mike agreed. Will said he slept with the door closed because it made him feel safe, but he refused to condemn Dustin’s air-circulating lifestyle, because Will had always been perfect.

_“It helps to keep the monsters out,”_ a nine-year-old Mike had said with deadly seriousness. 

Now, though, it would’ve been helpful to keep the monster _in_.

He heard his mother scream. 

Dustin ran heavily, taking the stairs two at a time, to find his mother standing in the kitchen over a pile of half-consumed gore and fur that looked like it had once been Mews. 

Oh, _shit_.

Claudia Henderson was a very strong woman. She’d realized she was a lesbian in her mid-adulthood and promptly divorced her homophobic husband because he was terrible to her queer son. She survived Hawkins, Indiana, as a single mother, a crazy cat lady, and a member of the Divorced Moms Club. She’d once gotten into a shouting match with Troy Walsh’s mother at a PTA meeting, and she’d won. 

Dustin had never seen his mother in this state. But then, he supposed that such a grisly murder could break even the most steadfast of women.

“Shit,” he said, this time out loud. “Mom - Mom, come on, you shouldn’t -” He started herding her out of the kitchen. 

“Dustin, what - something _ate_ him!” she protested hysterically.

“Yes, it does appear that that’s the case.” Dustin brought her into the living room, so Mews - or what had once been Mews, anyway - would be out of her line of sight. The guilt was starting to gnaw at him, hard.

“What could even do that?” his mother demanded, attempting to crane her neck. 

Dustin placed his body in front of her to block her view. “No idea,” he lied. “Stay here, I’m gonna go look for it.”

The first order of business was body disposal, though. Donning his mother’s dishwashing gloves, he gently took hold of Mews’ body. He shuddered as it came apart in his hands, but he shoved the pieces into a garbage bag as best he could. 

Mews was going on sixteen years old. The cat had been around nearly as long as Dustin could remember, hearty and bitter and tenacious. And now he was a pile of bones, among other remains. 

_Specimen appears carnivorous,_ Dustin thought to himself grimly.

There was still a fairly large smear of red on the linoleum, but the next priority was finding where the _hell_ D’Art had gotten off to. Dustin was hoping the little guy was still in the house, but he wasn’t particularly confident, and as he did his room-by-room sweep, his confidence continued to wane.

A broken window put the final nail in the coffin. D’Art was on the loose. 

Dustin sighed and hurried to the phone. The only thing he could really think to do was call Will, because Will was very sensible and would definitely have an answer.

Mike picked up. “What do you want?” he groaned.

“Still unused to the daylight hours I see, Michael,” Dustin drawled. “Put Will on.”

“Fucking rude. And he’s not here, he’s at school.” School? Oh shit, it was Monday, and Dustin had a class in - he checked his watch - fifteen minutes. “Shouldn’t you also be?”

“Why is Will back at school?” Dustin demanded. “He just got back from an alternate dimension!”

Mike groaned. “Oh my god, Dustin, you can’t just say that shit on the phone. But yeah, that’s what I said.”

“Okay, well, thanks, bye.” Dustin slammed the phone back in its cradle before Mike could ask any more questions. He took one deep breath, and then dialed the school’s number, taking a second to ask the secretary for a sub before asking after Will.

“Dustin?” he answered a moment later, breathless. “What’s going on?”

Dustin scratched the back of his neck. “So I may have gone back to the portal yesterday and brought home a baby monster and he might have eaten my mother’s cat, traumatizing said mother, and then escaped the house.”

Will exhaled slowly after an agonizing silence. “Oh my god.”

“Yeah, so if I were hypothetically in that situation, which is purely a thought exercise, what should I do?”

“Get your mom to my mom’s house, she can explain.” Will sighed heavily. “I’ll call a sub.”

“No, you don’t have-”

“Dustin, you’ve always been a terrible liar, I know this isn’t some thought exercise.” With that, Will hung up the phone.

Well, that was that. 

“Mom!” he called. “We’re going over to Joyce’s place!”

“Why?”

“Because I think you could use some emotional support in this time of devastating loss.” Dustin patted his mother on the shoulder. She’d taken to pacing while he did his search. He then used a hand on her shoulder to yank her towards the door.

“Dustin, I’m still in my housecoat!” she protested. 

He shook his head. “Right. Sorry. Go get dressed and I’ll make us some breakfast for the road.”

“You’re behaving strangely,” she accused.

Dustin shrugged and answered cheerfully, “When am I not?” Then he waved his hands. “Now shoo, it’s going to be a big day.”

After all, it was going to be the day Claudia Henderson learned that her son was simultaneously a genius and the dumbest man on the face of the planet.

* * *

Lonnie had only ever wanted boys; said sons were the only thing worth having. That daughters grew up and bitched and left you and only ever did a little of the work. 

Joyce found that she liked having a daughter, though. Holly was smart and strong-willed and more than happy to help around the house, and even though she had a Karen Wheeler-sized attitude, it was just another part of her to love.

She hadn’t expected to have another school-aged child after Will, but she had to admit it was fun to do elementary and middle school all over again. She had been mourning the fact her boys were all grown up when Karen appeared on her doorstep and said the magic words, “I’m divorcing Ted.” It had been pure instinct and a thirty-odd year crush that led Joyce to kiss her at those words, but Karen had kissed her back, and then she and Holly had moved in by the end of the week.

“Mama, I’m going to be _late_ ,” Holly whined, like it wasn’t her own darn fault she had chosen to stay in bed after Joyce woke her up. There were clouds in the sky and thunder rumbling ominously, and Joyce was not looking forward to driving in this.

“Yes, well, so will I, and my boss is scarier than your teacher,” she replied, grabbing two slices of nearly burnt toast out of the toaster. “Here. Breakfast.”

“Ew.” Holly wrinkled her nose. 

Joyce rolled her eyes. “If you want toast that isn’t burnt, get up early enough to make it yourself.”

Holly groaned. “Fine.”

Okay, so sometimes middle school was stressful all over again, but she still wouldn’t trade it for the world. 

“Where’s Jonathan?” Holly demanded, because he was usually the one to drive her to school.

Joyce shrugged helplessly. “He said he was driving home last night.” If she’d gotten one son back only to lose the other one, she would go mad. 

“With Nancy and Steve?” Holly clarified. She gave an annoyed exhale. “He’s probably still hanging out with them because they’re more fun.”

“Than who?” Joyce asked. 

“You.”

Joyce rolled her eyes again. “Ouch,” she said dryly. “Are you done? I’m not sure how much more of this my delicate feelings can take.”

Holly huffed. “I’m going to wait in the car.” The door had already slammed before Joyce could say anything.

One tired and ruffled Karen Wheeler emerged from their bedroom. “She’s having a mood?”

“That one’s all you, sweetheart.” Joyce shoved the burnt toast in her mouth. “Enjoy your day off.”

“Have a good shift,” Karen replied, kissing Joyce on the cheek. With that, she was out the door.

When she got outside, she saw three things: first, Holly was not by the car. Second, she was bleeding. And third, she was being threatened by some monstrous _thing_ , six feet tall and slimy and entirely too long. 

Holly screamed.

Joyce didn’t have much, but she had a travel cup full of scalding hot coffee that was supposed to stay warm til Melvald’s, so she took it and she threw, hitting the thing square in the back. The lid flew off the cup and the liquid splashed down its back, prompting the monster to rear back and screech. 

The sound was one of the worst things Joyce had ever heard. 

Holly staggered at the sound, but she used its distraction to pelt back towards Joyce, breathing ragged and silent tears on her face. She burrowed into Joyce’s side.

This left the problem of the monster, who now was _very_ angry at Joyce, assuming it experienced emotions. It took inhuman, lumbering steps forward and she was backed up against her car, realizing suddenly that she was a little bit screwed. 

“Hey, asshole!” The shout was accompanied by a burst of flame. “Leave them alone!”

Joyce followed the source of the flames to one fluffy and dishevelled Dustin Henderson, holding a can of bug spray behind a Bic lighter for his own at-home flamethrower. The monster was now suddenly a hell of a lot more preoccupied by that, turning and getting blasted again, and then all of a sudden, it blinked out of existence.

“What the _hell_ was that?” Joyce demanded. 

“Uhhh…” Dustin faltered. “Here, you know what, why don’t you and my mom go inside?”

“Holly has school,” Joyce protested halfheartedly, even though she had no desire to take her eyes off her girl after that occurrence.

“Yeah, well, me too, but it looks like we’re all here instead. Ma!” Dustin shouted. “You can get out of the car now!”

A very pale Caludia Henderson emerged, still in her usual sweaters but without the usual baked goods to accompany them. 

“Dustin, what is going on?” she demanded.

He made shooing movements with his hands. “Inside. Inside. All will be explained.”

Holly was still bleeding from a cut on her cheek, so Joyce used her nervous energy to fuss over that in the kitchen. “Baby, what happened?” she asked quietly as she pushed a bandaid over the wound.

“You were taking too long, so I wanted to climb the tree,” Holly said, wincing. “But I fell and then that - that thing was there.”

The front door opened and shut carefully, and then Will was in the kitchen, examining Holly’s face. 

“What happened?” he asked. 

Joyce shrugged helplessly. 

“Alright, everyone in the living room!” Karen’s voice boomed. “And someone tell me what on _earth_ is going on here.”

Joyce smiled in spite of herself, and got a conspiratorial one in return from Will. “Guess we’ve been summoned.”

When Joyce walked into the room, she was struck by how Claudia had gravitated towards the same chair from social calls, and how Karen had somehow had time to put on a nice outfit. It was almost like a regular day to spend time together, if one overlooked the glare taking over Karen’s features.

Will sighed tiredly, more than anyone his age should’ve been able to feel. Joyce’s heart clenched. 

“How much do you know about what happened since I disappeared?”

Claudia blinked rapidly. “What do you mean, disappeared?”

Okay, so that was one vote of nothing. 

“There’s a little runaway girl with superpowers and the US government is not to be trusted,” Karen replied succinctly. “That doesn’t explain the creature.”

Will raked a hand through his hair. Her strong, tired boy. “This thing - there’s a whole bunch of them where I was lost,” Will explained. “And when I met the girl, she was running away from a monster - the same one that just attacked Holly.”

“What was it?” Holly asked, arms wrapped tightly around herself. She had her brave and determined face on, and Joyce was suddenly immeasurably proud of her daughter. 

Will shrugged helplessly. “I’m calling them Demogorgons,” he replied. Joyce was pretty sure she’d heard Hopper call them that, too. “Like the D&D monster. It - Well, it’s easier. They’re from a parallel dimension like ours, but...wrong. That’s where I went. That’s where Mike got me back from, and Dustin went and brought a baby through.” 

Will frowned with the kind of frustration Joyce hadn’t seen him direct at Dustin since high school.

“A baby?” she asked, then shook her head. “No, you know what? Start from the beginning.”

* * *

It was embarrassing to admit, but Mike had no idea what to do being awake during the day. 

He was used to shifts ranging from eight to twelve hours and collapsing into bed, barely seeing the sun once he woke up to do it all over again. But it was 4pm, Waffle House was still closed due to the parallel dimension taking out its generator, and Mike was bored. 

He’d eaten lunch that day. Mike couldn’t remember the last time he’d eaten lunch. Granted, it was a reheated tupperware of spaghetti-o’s, but that was still something. He’d watched TV, too, but mostly he’d flitted nervously around the house, worrying about Eleven and Will and Lucas and Max.

Will should have been home from school by now. It was stressing Mike out more than the fact Will had gone back in the first place, because what if something had happened? What if he’d gotten lost on the other side again?

There was a hurried knocking on the door, just shy of pounding. It couldn’t be Will, because Will had an inhuman ability to know where his keys were at all times, but Mike didn’t know who else would be visiting. His mother, maybe?

Mike opened the door and his heart did a flip. There was Lucas in a maroon bomber jacket, looking beautiful as hell, on _his_ doorstep. 

“Lucas, hey,” he croaked out, cursing the way he stuttered like they were back in high school. “What’s up?”

He stepped back and Lucas followed him inside. “Have you heard from Max at all today?” Lucas asked, hands buried anxiously in his pockets. 

Of course it was about Max. Mike was jealous, but he felt worried, too. Here he’d been worrying about Will - what if someone else was the next victim? What if it was Max?

He shook his head. 

“Crap.” Lucas tilted his head back. “I was hoping they’d be here.”

“Why would Max be here?” Mike asked, confused, but Lucas just gave him a look.

Before Mike could ask any more questions, Lucas was opening the door. “Come on,” he prompted. “I’m afraid they’re at home.”

Home was just about the worst place they could be. There was a reason Max spent all day at class or sleeping and all night at Waffle House.

Mike sat in Lucas’ passenger seat in awkward silence, drumming his fingers anxiously against his knees. Lucas was chewing on his lower lip, which was very distracting and not at all helpful - it was a nervous habit that had annoyed Mike since high school.

Well, maybe ‘annoyed’ wasn’t quite the right word.

“I’m sure they’re fine,” Lucas said with conviction, strong enough that Mike felt a little convinced. “Max is tough.”

“Totally.” Mike nodded. A memory popped into his brain and he couldn’t help but smile. “Like, remember when they broke the football captain’s nose for calling them ‘the cutest dyke in town?’”

That startled a laugh out of Lucas. “Oh, man, I absolutely do. I dunno _what_ he was trying to accomplish.”

“He said something about you, too, didn’t he?” Mike asked, wrinkling his nose as he tried to remember.

“Both of us,” Lucas replied, his smile only faltering a second. “Something racist to me, something homophobic to you. That’s what really got Max going, you know - they were gonna walk away until he said that.”

Mike’s face warmed. “Huh.” That was new information.

The Hargrove household hadn’t had an electric blue Camaro in the driveway in over seven years, and yet Mike was still somehow surprised. It’s not like he’d ever gone over to Max’s place - they’d always come to him, or Lucas’ while Mike was over.

Karen would occasionally ask Mike when he was going to ‘make that girl your girlfriend,’ which he took issues with on _so many_ levels. He never figured out how to explain to his mother that he was already Lucas and Max’s professional third wheel.

Lucas’ second-in-command for moments like this, of which there had been many. Though usually not at their house. 

The door was unlocked, which was not a good sign. When Mike pushed it open - he’d stepped subconsciously in front of Lucas, as if to protect him - he nearly fell over with the force of the shouting inside.

“ _Worthless, good-for-nothing_ -” 

Already Mike felt his temper flaring, because no one had any right to speak to Max like that, least of all Neil Hargrove. 

“You’re out at all hours, you’re skipping the classes that I _so graciously_ pay for, when you’re not even _mine_ -” Mike and Lucas made it into the living room just as Neil whipped around to his wife. “Susan, your daughter is out of control!”

“I’m not _anyone’s_ daughter!” Max snapped. 

Susan just stood there gaping, cradling her one arm against her chest. It looked like her wrist might be broken, from where Mike was standing, and she definitely had a cut on her cheek that looked like it was from a ring.

“There you go again,” Neil hissed. “I told her sending you to Chicago was a terrible idea, that’s where all the faggots live, but your mother said, ‘No, it’s such a good school! Let her follow her dreams!’ Well, your dreams led you to this. Congratulations.”

Mike sucked in a breath, quiet as he could, but it was too late. Neil was alerted to their presence. 

“And this is your boyfriend, isn’t it? The same n-”

“Don’t you fucking dare!” Max shouted, cutting him off. “You racist asshole! No, we’re not dating, we’re just friends, but so what if we were?”

“Thought you were a dyke,” Neil shot back, as if he was the pinnacle of logic. “Thought you said you weren’t a girl. Well, girls date boys.”

Mike scoffed. “Mr. Hargrove, please. It’s 1993.” He didn’t know exactly what he was doing, just that he needed Neil to _stop_ yelling at Max, so he opened his mouth and went for it. “Girls date girls and boys date boys and it’s hardly our fault you’re stuck in the past.”

Neil stared down his nose. “And I suppose you’d know, wouldn’t you, young man? What, is the black boy yours, then?”

Mike tried to calculate the answer that would get them out of this situation best. He felt Lucas creeping behind him, getting closer to Max and Susan, but Neil was going to notice, and he was closer to the exit than they were. 

“Yes, he is,” Mike stated flatly, ignoring the choked off sound behind him. He wasn’t sure if it was Max or Lucas and he didn’t want to waste brainpower trying to figure it out. “We make sweet love every night, and we’re going to get married and raise biracial adopted babies and destroy the very fabric of American culture.”

Mike felt the hands around his neck before he processed what was happening, but then Neil had him pinned against a wall.

Well, this was less than ideal.

“You filthy fucking -” Neil seethed. “You know what we did to guys like you when I was your age? We beat them to pulp, and if they were still fags, we took ‘em out back and we shot ‘em like the lame dogs you are.”

“It seems,” Mike wheezed, “like you’re still trying to do things that way. Is that why your son left the minute he could?”

He got a backhand for that one, and a cut on his cheek that probably matched Susan. “Your lot just doesn’t know how to shut up, huh?” Neil demanded. “Jesus Christ.”

Mike was scrawny. He’d never had a chance against the high school bullies, and Max had thrown a punch for him on more than one occasion. But what he did have was physics, so he let himself turn to dead weight and fell right out of Neil’s hands, then scrambled around his legs. 

The living room was empty, so Mike took that as his cue. “Bye, Mr. Hargrove.” He gave a jaunty wave that held more confidence than he felt. “See you later.”

He made it out the door and was almost bowled over by a small ginger comet. 

“You idiot!” Max shrieked. “What were you _thinking_?” Their hand skittered across the cut on his cheek and his heart beat double-time.

“Hey, it worked, didn’t it?” Mike protested. “I distracted him long enough for you all to escape.”

“And now you’re _hurt_ ,” Max insisted, caring a hell of a lot more than Mike had thought they would. “You didn’t have to pretend to be gay just to piss his off, Jesus. There were other ways that wouldn’t involve him _trying to kill you_. I mean honestly -”

Max kept going, ranting about concern and how they were going to kill Neil for touching their friends, but there was one thing about the sentence that stuck out most to him. “Who’s pretending?”

“What?” Max stopped dead in the middle of a sentence.

“What, you think you’re the only one in Hawkins?” Mike jutted his chin, feeling oddly defensive. “I like guys. Big fucking deal.”

“Oh.” Max got real quiet for a second, chewing on their lower lip, gazing at him with an uncomfortable intensity that left Mike feeling warm and embarrassed. “Well, you didn’t have to _tell_ him.”

“I did it to protect you and Lucas. And your mom,” Mike added as an afterthought, because he supposed he was doing it for Susan, too. “It was the best way I could think of to guarantee his attention stayed on me.”

Max hugged him fiercely. “You’re _so stupid_ ,” they mumbled into his shoulder.

“Christ, Mike, you scared me.” Lucas wrapped his arms around both of them. “I thought he was going to kill you.”

Only then did Mike have time to feel embarrassed about what he’d said, spurred by his very real crush on Lucas and the way his brain was going haywire in the embrace. “Uh, sorry I said you were my boyfriend.”

Lucas shook his head dismissively. “Nah. We’re good.” He grinned, patting Mike’s shoulder. “I’m totally up for raising biracial babies and ‘destroying the very fabric of American culture’ with you, man.”

Mike felt his face flush all the way. It didn’t sound bad at all.

“Max,” Susan called tentatively. 

They pulled apart quickly. How the hell had they forgotten about Max’s mom? 

“Shit. Shit, shit, shit.” Max raked a hand through their fuzzy hair. “I didn’t think anywhere past this. We can’t go back, obviously, but where the hell -” They looked back at their mother, looking lost and hurt. “She needs some place to be.”

“What about you?” Mike protested. 

Max waved a hand. “I’ll manage.” He wasn’t convinced but their eyes said they weren’t budging.

What to do with Susan Hargrove, then. Mike and Lucas glanced at each other, but they were coming up empty, until Mike remembered the women he believed could solve any problem.

“Ms. Mayfield,” he began, figuring using Neil’s last name was probably a bad idea right now. “How would you like to join the Divorced Moms’ Club?”

* * *

Kali preferred the dark, and not just because it was easier to carry out assassinations when no one could see. 

They’d been planning this for weeks, and the arrival of Jane wasn’t going to do anything to change that. She was a part of the team now; Kali’s little sister, who everyone accepted without question. And that meant she came on the missions, she fought the same fights, and she was allowed to make her own choices.

Such as which mask she wanted. She chose the ridiculously racist geisha mask to obscure her face, and Kali nodded. It was a good choice, definitely Dottie’s favorite. Kali was also pretty sure Jane herself was Dottie’s favorite, judging by the way the woman was cooing, but who could really blame her?

Mick was driving the van, but she still reached over to squeeze Kali’s knee supportively. “How are you doing?” she asked softly. 

Kali shrugged, eyes not leaving the road ahead, even if she wasn’t the one behind the wheel. 

“We don’t have to do this if you don’t want to,” Mick offered. 

That got Kali’s attention, snapped her head over to Mick. “ _No_ ,” she insisted. “We’re doing this.”

‘Doing this’ included breaking into a dilapidated townhouse on the Northside and finding one of Brenner’s former researchers passed out on the couch. He looked a mess in khakis and a stained wifebeater, and no one would ever guess he’d been a government employee at one point. 

Kali chucked an empty beer can at his head, waking him up, and he startled.

“Who the hell are you people?” he demanded. 

This led to Kali’s favorite part, lifting up the masks. The man didn’t see anything in her face, but when Jane copied the movement, the man blanched. 

“Bad man,” Jane said solemnly. 

“Did this man hurt you?” Kali asked. Jane nodded. “I see.”

She put a bullet in his left knee and ignored his screaming. There was a shock of crimson on the couch behind it.

Jane paled slightly, but she held tight to the gun Kali had given her, which looked too-big and toy-like in her hands. 

“Where’s Brenner?” Kali demanded. 

“I don’t know.” The man flinched as she stepped forward menacingly. “I don’t know! I left the lab when Subject Eleven was five-years-old.”

“Where was he then?”

“Under the old DOE building. They never really shut down the lab.”

“Hm.” A good lead. “Is he still there?”

“I don’t know.” Kali raised the gun again. “I don’t! He probably is, but like I said, I left seven years ago.”

“Why?” Her voice was clipped tight. 

“It - I just couldn’t stand working with kids.”

Kali laughed dryly. “Well, that’s certainly a soft and comforting euphemism.”

The man bristled, defensive. “I needed money! I was going to starve!”

Kali rolled her eyes, gesturing grandly with the gun. “We all need money. We’re all trying not to starve.” She leveled the gun at his other knee. “Some of us don’t perform torture disguised as science experiments on little kids.” 

_Bang._

The splotches of red on the couch weren’t symmetrical, which Axel would have called tragic, but the important part was that the man definitely couldn’t run away now. 

He was sobbing quietly, but Kali felt no pity in her heart. Only righteous rage. Her name meant she destroyed evil, and this man counted. 

“Well, if you left seven years ago…” She examined her fingernails with feigned nonchalance. “I suppose you don’t have anything more worthwhile to tell me. Do you remember Jane?” she asked, gesturing with her gun. 

The man swallowed heavily and nodded. “Subject Eleven.”

“Her mother named her _Jane_ ,” Kali snapped. “You monsters gave her a number.”

“It wasn’t my idea, I just - all I did was collect the data,” he protested. “Please, I didn’t do anything.”

Kali looked over at Jane, the tiniest smirk pulling across her lips. “Well, now, we all know that’s a lie.” Carefully, gingerly, she raised the hand Jane was holding the gun in to make sure the barrel was right against his head. “Jane, you may do the honors.”

The girl’s hand was shaking, finger quivering on the trigger. Kali waited a moment, and then another.

“Can’t.” Jane looked absolutely wrecked, terrified of whatever she was going to receive as punishment for her failure. Her arm holding the gun dropped limply to her side and her whole body swayed like a tree in the breeze. 

The man let out a breath of relief, which only made Jane seem more conflicted. 

Kali pried the gun carefully out of Jane’s hand. “It’s okay.” Was she frustrated that Jane couldn’t do this? Yeah. But she was just as capable of doing it herself. What needed to be done would get done. “Go wait outside with the others.”

Jane nodded and hurried away, only sparing one more glance over her shoulder. 

The man’s relief quickly faded as he realized he was left with the deadlier of the two. Really, he’d lost: Jane’s execution would have been quick, painless.

Kali liked to play with her food. 

“Just us, then,” she commented dryly. “Oh, and of course, your old boss.” 

Conjuring an image of Brenner was easier than breathing. Over the years, her memory had been faded and rewritten and smoothed over, but her hatred still burned bright, and she would never, ever forget the cruelty in his eyes. 

The man let out a strangled noise of fear. 

“What’s your name?” she asked.

He looked at her, wide-eyed, for a split second, before returning his attention to the menacing Brenner. “Thomas Burns.”

Burns. How useful. 

Flames of Kali’s own creation started crawling over every surface, the air filling with thick smoke. She knew how her eyes must look in the fire; she saw his eyes and they looked like prey. 

“Please - I don’t want to die,” he begged.

Kali tilted her head. “Interesting. I didn’t want to spend the better part of my childhood as a lab rat pumped full of drugs. But I suppose we can’t always get what we want, can we?” She shrugged with false sympathy. “At least you’ll die knowing it was your actions and nothing else that brought this on.”

She pulled the trigger before he had a chance to react, lodging a bullet in the left of his chest. He gave a final wheeze as she pulled one last time and finished it between his eyes.

“Time to go,” she declared, walking out of the back door. Axel whooped and dropped a match, and the whole house started to go up in flames - real ones this time, not Kali’s illusions.

Mick was still behind the wheel; she always said being the one who drove away calmed her down, even though Funshine was more than happy to do it. Kali slid into the seat next to her as the others piled into the back. 

They’d made it about ten miles before Kali finally spoke. 

“She couldn’t pull the trigger.” 

She and Mick both glanced in the rearview mirror, watching Jane asleep with her head in Fun’s lap as he pet her hair. Mick hummed.

“Are you upset with her?” she asked Kali, not a hint of judgment in her tone, just curiosity. That was Mick’s thing - Kali never had any bad emotions, ever. Mick just wanted to know them all, even the ones that made Kali hate herself.

Kkali shrugged, chewing on her thumbnail. “A little,” she said, but it didn’t quite capture what she was feeling. “I’m…”

The silence stretched on, because Kali had never been good with her feelings, but Mick let it stretch, reaching out to lay her hand on Kali’s thigh.

“I’m confused,” she settled on finally. “I could see that he’d hurt her. But she didn’t want to hurt him back.”

Mick hummed again. “She doesn’t have the same raging fire in her soul that you do, Kal.” Always a responsible driver, she signalled her merge as she pulled onto the highway that cut through the city. “Different people react to the same trauma differently.”

Kali shook her head. “We don’t have the same trauma.” Guilt poured out of her next sentence, an emotion she never had trouble identifying. “I got out. I _left her_ , Mick.”

“You know she doesn’t see it like that,” Mick replied.

“How do you know that?”

“Because she came all the way from God Knows Where to find you, the girl she calls ‘sister.’”

“Yeah, well, I’m not sure she’ll want to be my sister after tonight.” Kali crossed her arms tightly over her chest. “I wouldn’t blame her.”

“Just because she doesn’t have your fire doesn’t mean she’ll hate you for the flames,” Mick said softly, sparing a glance off the road to watch Kali’s face illuminated by streetlights. 

Mick looked beautiful in the same light, and Kali was once again so grateful for her family. She sighed. “I guess it’s a good thing at least one of us isn’t burning.”

* * *

Nancy’s head was absolutely killing her. 

It felt like someone slowly driving a wedge through her skull, attempting to slowly peel her open and flip her inside out. She groaned. 

The sound summoned Steve. “Are you okay?” he asked for the fifteenth time in as many minutes. Nancy bit her tongue, trying not to snap at him. “Can I do anything for you?”

Well, she was thirsty. “Water, please?”

“On it!” He darted out of the room, brushing past Jonathan as the other man entered to sit on the end of the bed. 

“How are you feeling?” he asked softly, gently, which was a less stupid question than ‘Are you okay?’ but still pretty stupid.

“Terrible,” she replied, staring up at the white ceiling fan. The only upside was that she was getting to spend quality time with both Steve and Jonathan, both doting on her. That was pretty nice, she had to admit.

But there was no time for her to be laid up. “I slept all day. We’re in the middle of a crisis, I need - we need to regroup.” Nancy tried to push her way up to sitting. The room spun. 

“Nope.” Jonathan put both of his warm, solid hands on her shoulders and pushed her back onto the bed. “Steve said you’re not leaving the house, and he’s right.”

“You always take his side.” Nancy pouted childishly, knowing full well it was silly, but she did it anyway. 

“Not always, just when he’s right,” Jonathan shot back with a small smile. “Which, shockingly enough, happens a lot.”

“I’m a genius,” Steve replied airily, carrying two glasses of water. He passed the first to Nancy and the second to Jonathan, then stood with his arms crossed beside the bed. “So what am I right about this time?”

If Nancy didn’t have head trauma, she definitely would’ve had a snappy retort, but she didn’t. Instead, Jonathan answered. “That Nancy shouldn’t leave the house.”

Steve spluttered. “For god’s - of _course_ I’m right about that, you remember the amount of concussions I got in high school!” Namely from basketball and Billy Hargrove, sometimes at the same time. “I know what I’m talking about.”

“I know you do,” Nancy replied testily. “That’s not the issue. The issue is that Will is alive, we still don’t know where Eleven is, and Hawkins is under attack by monsters from an alternate dimension.”

“That’s not a good excuse to put your _health_ at risk!” Steve raked a hand through his fluffy hair. He’d been growing it out recently, much to his father’s chagrin, but Nancy thought it made him look rather pretty. 

So Jonathan, ever the savior, suggested, “Why don’t we have everyone come over here? Nancy doesn’t agitate her injuries, but we still make progress on” - he gestured emphatically - “whatever this is.”

“I take it back, you’re the genius, Johnny boy,” Steve replied with a megawatt grin. Jonathan flushed red from his neckline to his hair.

“I’m - I’ll go call my mom,” he said, ducking his head and hurrying out of the room.

God, she loved them both.

Steve sat down beside Nancy and started petting her hair. It felt nice. “You know I love you, right?” he asked. She hummed her assent. “And I know I do and say a lot of things you don’t like, but it’s because I love you. I’m trying to keep you safe.” He twisted a strand of her hair around his fingers. “You never put yourself first. Someone has to.”

Nancy sighed. “I know,” she replied. “It’s just - I’m not made of glass, Steve.”

“I know you’re not, babe.” He kissed her forehead. “But you’re not made of steel, either.”

She hummed again, refusing to acknowledge that he was right, but she did nestle slightly closer into his side. He kept petting her hair, soothing, and Nancy remembered their honeymoon.

How do you say “I miss you” to the person you wake up next to every morning? 

“I love you too,” she said instead, and he leaned over to give her a soft kiss on the lips that made her warm. 

“They’ll be here in fifteen minutes, according to your mom.” Jonathan was standing at the end of the bed, but she’d never even heard him come in. “It sounds like we’ll have a full house.”

“Perfect. Help me up,” Nancy demanded, the moment with Steve being over and done. 

Steve huffed exasperatedly, but he tucked himself under her shoulder and Jonathan joined him from the other side, both of them carefully easing Nancy up much slower than she wanted. That said, she didn’t get dizzy this time, so she would grudgingly admit they maybe had a point. 

Getting down the stairs was an awkward endeavor, and finally Steve just rolled his eyes. “Jonathan, move.”

The other man frowned but did as he was directed, and then Steve swung Nancy off her feet into a bridal carry. Nancy shrieked, but she laughed too, and that made Steve laugh and Jonathan follow suit. They laughed so hard Steve _almost_ dropped her in the kitchen, but Jonathan caught and steadied them both, and somehow that just made them laugh harder. 

“Here you go, my lady.” Steve deposited her gently onto the couch. “Now, I’m going to go make sure we have snacks and coffee ready for when everyone shows up.”

Nancy rolled her eyes. “Steve, it’s a meeting about saving the town from government conspiracies and weird monsters.” No matter how many times she said that, it did not feel any more normal on her tongue. “Not a social call.”

“That doesn’t mean I can’t be a good host,” Steve replied, affronted. “Besides, if nothing else, Jonathan will drink my coffee, right Jonathan?” He nodded. “So there.” Steve stuck out his tongue at her, leaving it there until Nancy giggled, and then turned on his heel to prepare. 

“He’s something else,” she said softly to Jonathan, who was awkwardly standing at the end of the couch.

Jonathan gave a fond smile. “Yeah, he is.” His hands were shoved in his pockets and it looked like he had no idea what to do with himself. Fond, but awkward. Fitting, but not quite. 

Nancy would have none of that. “C’mere,” she suggested, lifting her upper body in the world’s worst sit-up. “Sit down.”

Jonathan looked at her dubiously, but when it became clear she was going to keep torturing her ab muscles until he complied, he sighed and sat down in the corner of the couch. 

“Perfect.” She laid her head back down in his lap. She didn’t have to look up to know he was blushing - Jonathan was always blushing - but he still put his fingers in her hair and she purred, contented.

When Steve came back with two mugs, Nancy was ready to defend herself, but he just looked at the scene on the couch and smiled softly. “Here.” He passed a mug of black tea to Jonathan. 

“I thought you were making him coffee,” Nancy pointed out, teasing. 

“No, I’m making coffee in general. I’m making Jonathan’s favorite tea specifically for Jonathan.” Steve rolled his eyes like all this was obvious. “But if no one else drinks my coffee, he will, because he’d never let me go down like that, right, bud?”

“Course not,” Jonathan mumbled into his mug. 

There was a knock on the door and Steve rushed to get it. Mike was the first one in the living room, giving Nancy a _look_ for having her head in Jonathan’s lap. 

She had not forgotten the “You should have married Jonathan” fiasco. Just because her brother was right about Jonathan being cute and good for her didn’t mean he had to be an ass about it.

She flipped him two middle fingers. 

“Nancy!”

She put her hands down. “Sorry, Mom.” She rolled her eyes. 

Nancy wondered how everyone had fit into the Byers’ place. Hell, they probably hadn’t. She glanced around and took stock, noting Dustin’s mother in surprise, and - she was _pretty_ sure that was Max’s mom. 

“Nancy, what the hell happened to your face?” Mike demanded. “Besides the usual.”

She rolled her eyes again. “Real mature, Michael. We got in a car accident.”

Karen sucked in a breath. “Are you okay?” she demanded.

“I’m fine,” Nancy said, just as Steve cut in “She has a concussion.” 

“What happened?” Will asked. 

Jonathan decided to answer. “We were driving and this...thing, appeared out of nowhere.”

“A cat,” Steve provided. Nancy glared at him. “Okay, okay, not a cat, but cat-shaped, with the four legs and everything.”

“But it was slimy,” Jonathan added. “Like...some kind of amphibian, maybe?”

Mike was annoying as shit, but he was also _fiercely_ protective. He whipped around on Dustin. “You _asshole!_ ” he spat. “This is _your fault!_ ”

“Easy there, tiger.” Lucas had his hands on Mike’s shoulders, smoothing them down his arms. “Chill.”

“What happened to _you_ , Mike?” Nancy finally managed to ask. God, there were too many people in this house. 

He glanced at the ground awkwardly, deflating. “Nothing.” Of course, ‘nothing’ didn’t cut your cheek open and leave fingerprint bruises on your throat.

“This dumbass fought Neil,” Max answered, a mix of exasperated and fond. And...something else that Nancy couldn’t quite place. Something warm. “He just...lost it today, and Mike fought him while Lucas got me and my mom out of the house. Speaking of which,” they raised their voice to be heard above the din, “quit fucking around, everybody, my mom needs to go to the emergency room.”

“Max, I’m fine,” Susan - Susan? Yes, Nancy was sure that was her name - Hargrove said quickly. “Really.”

“You’re not,” Claudia Henderson replied brusquely. “That’s quite a fracture you’ve got there.” She glanced up. “I’ll take her to the emergency room. You all - do whatever it is you need to do.”

Karen caught Claudia’s arm. “Wait. Can you take Holly with you? Just in case?” 

Claudia nodded. “Great idea. We can all get milkshakes.” She smiled warmly at Susan, so wide the other woman couldn’t help her blush. “Nothing like a milkshake to fix up a rough day.”

Steve locked the door behind them, then came back to the living room, surveying the motley group in front of him. “I made coffee,” he offered, and Karen sighed.

“Thank you, Steven,” she said, relieved, and Steve came back with two cups, one with two creams and one sugar for Karen, and a black coffee for Joyce. 

Sometimes Nancy was pretty sure her mom liked Steve better than she liked her own daughter.

“Hop’s coming,” Joyce declared after swallowing nearly a third of her mug. “Soon as he gets off the shift.” 

“We’ll catch him up.” Nancy waved her hand. “Okay, so let’s talk about _what the fuck_ is going on.”

“Nancy!” Karen hissed again. 

Mike shook his head. “Mom, you’ve gotta admit this is a ‘What the fuck’ kind of situation.”

Karen sighed and sat down heavily in an armchair. “Fine.”

“But also, you already know what’s happening,” Mike pointed out, because he couldn’t be on Nancy’s side for long. “You went looking for Eleven.”

“No, no. You misunderstand.” She steepled her fingers and lifted her legs so Steve could slide on the other side of the couch. “I want us all to combine our knowledge. Starting at the very first moment.”

“We just did that,” Dustin groaned. 

“Well, not with us, so you’ll just have to do it again.” Nancy was steely with her lack of sympathy. 

The kids - well, they were far too old to be called kids now - settled on the floor, Dustin ending up with his head in Will’s lap and Mike and Max flanking Lucas just a bit too close. 

“So I was out drawing past midnight,” Will began, absently playing with Dustin’s hair. “I just got this - this _feeling_ that I needed to be outside, awake, so I was.” 

Joyce nodded like she too was familiar with these ‘feelings.’ Well, maybe she was. Jonathan always seemed to know stuff without a good reason for why he knew it. 

“And this little girl came running towards me, out of the woods. Eleven, though I never got her name. There was a monster chasing her, which I’ve named a Demogorgon just so it’s easier to tell the story. The thing was - weird. Slimy, vaguely humanoid. Didn’t have a face. Anyway, I rushed it with the rifle to try to protect the girl and then next thing I knew, I was in another dimension.”

Weird, but probably not the weirdest thing about the situation, if Nancy had to guess how the rest of the stories were going to go. She worried idly with her wedding ring. 

“Basically it’s Hawkins, but it’s as if some...parasite attached itself to the town and drove it to decay.” Will glanced down at Dustin, who gave an encouraging nod. “There are - people there, but they’re not really people. Like Shades? They reflect people who exist in this dimension - or who used to.” He looked guiltily at Nancy, then quickly away. Nancy was perturbed and she intended to find out just what he’d seen over there that weighed on his conscience. 

“Did you see what was causing the sickness?” she asked. 

“The parasite is this giant smoky spider-looking entity who all the Shades call ‘It.’” Nancy could hear the capital I. Will dug into his pocket and pulled out the crayon drawing he’d done in the Upside Down, pointing at the blue legs and red eyes. “It seemed...at least somewhat sentient. One of the Shades said It had a special interest in me because I don’t have a corresponding Shade on that side.”

Steve’s brow furrowed. “Why?”

Will shrugged helplessly. “Beats me. There’s a portal in the Waffle House cellar, that’s how Mike rescued me.” He shrugged again. “I’m not sure what separates us, or anything, and there’s not a portal near our house, so we don’t know.”

Nancy asked a few more questions, all of which Will dutifully answered, before she turned to point at Mike. “Your turn. So you came home from Waffle House and found a strange twelve-year-old in your house?”

Mike nodded. “Yeah. And she said Will was gone. I didn’t know what to do, so I called Dustin, and then Dustin called Lucas and Max.” 

There was a powerful knock on the door, but Nancy was comfortable and she didn’t want to free either of her boys.

“I’ve got it.” Joyce stood up and disappeared, then came back with a disgruntled Chief of Police in tow. “Look what the cat dragged in.”

“Good timing,” Lucas commented. “We all went to check out that old abandoned building the next day - you know, the DOE on the outskirts of town? - and Hopper came with us. Turns out it wasn’t so deserted after all.”

“And Lucas and Hop met Dr. Creepo who we’re pretty sure is the guy Eleven calls ‘Papa,’” Max chimed in. “We went to the library, did some research, found him involved in MKUltra. You heard all of our talk about that, that’s what your friend was involved in. So you’re caught up on that.”

Nancy nodded, ignoring the way it made her head spin slightly. “Right. And then Mike said he was going to the portal, and Eleven threw him into a wall with her mind -” Steve made a noise of protest in the back of his throat. “What, do you have a more plausible explanation?”

He held up his hands defensively. “Look, you just have to admit that this whole thing is weird as shit and totally unbelievable.”

Nancy rolled her eyes. “Yeah, but I _saw it happen._ We all did.”

“Anyway,” Mike interrupted. “You all went on a roadtrip to Indianapolis to find El after she ran away. But clearly that didn’t work.”

“Met her mom. Met her aunt. Her aunt’s nice, her mom’s in a permanent vegetative state.” Nancy’s fists clenched at her sides. “The official story is that Terry miscarried, so we think Brenner said that and kept the baby for experiments. Our Eleven. Becky - her sister - didn’t even know Terry’s daughter had survived.”

Jonathan spoke up for the first time. “She told us a bit about the study,” he said softly. “And the girl Terry befriended, who was just a young teenager. A little Indian girl, ball of anger.”

Nancy twisted to look at him quizzically. “She didn’t say that.”’

“She didn’t?” Jonathan blinked slowly. “Well, it’s true.”

“How do you know?” Steve asked. 

Jonathan shrugged and let out a disgruntled noise. “I don’t know, the same way I always know when you or Nancy are mad? It’s an emotion, I’m good at reading between the lines.”

“You’re an empath,” Will said softly. 

The three of them stopped their bickering to look over at him. “What?”

Everyone else’s eyes were on him too, so apparently this was new to the whole room. Will fidgeted awkwardly.

“We have powers. Like she does.” Will twisted his fingers together. “I think, anyway. But I have - I know things before they happen, and you always know about other people’s feelings, and Mom’s got a bit of both.”

“That makes no sense.”

“How am I feeling right now?” Steve asked.

Jonathan rolled his eyes. “That’s too easy, you can figure it out from situational context.”

“Summon a specific emotion,” Lucas suggested, and Nancy could see him slipping into clinical mode. “Think of a few things that make you feel a certain, unrelated way. And then Jonathan can read it.”

Steve shrugged and closed his eyes. “Whenever you’re ready, Johnny boy.”

Will watched the flush crawl up Jonathan’s face. 

“Steve, what the hell?” he demanded, strangled. 

Steve’s eyes shot open. “Wait, shit, you actually felt that?” He looked horrified. “You saw what I was thinking?”

Jonathan shook his head. “No, just...felt the feeling. You’re broadcasting. You’re always broadcasting.”

“I think it’s just cuz you’re close to them,” Will cut in. Then he shrugged. “I don’t know, I’m still trying to figure all this out.”

“So anyway, you met her mom but she wasn’t there, and then you called me,” Mike prompted. “I know you didn’t leave right away, so what happened?”

Nancy felt the same frustration rising again, and Jonathan started to pet her hair soothingly. “We went to the library to research but we didn’t find anything.”

“And then we drove home, and I hit that thing that was not a cat,” Steve finished. “So, if it wasn’t a cat, what the fuck was it?”

Karen just sighed, but didn’t correct his profanity. 

“Yeah, Dustin.” Will glared down at the man in his lap, and Nancy was pretty sure she’d _never_ seen Will pissed at Dustin before. “What the fuck was it?”

Will rarely swore, so Nancy startled. 

“Well,” Dustin began sheepishly. “After we went to the portal and successfully rescued our beloved Will…” He reached up to pat Will’s cheek, which got him a grudging smile. “I went back to do some science. Investigate the place. And I...may have brought back one of the baby monsters I found.”

Mike gasped, so apparently this was news to him as much as Nancy. “You dumbass! I thought you just - I didn’t realize -”

“It was going to be _fine_ , I was going to keep him in my house and study him,” Dustin protested.

Max snorted. “What _actually_ happened?”

It took a second, but Dustin finally answered. “He ate my mom’s cat and escaped out the window in the middle of the night.”

“Only to wind up in the middle of the street for me to crash into,” Steve groaned. “Nice one, bud.”

“Hey!” Dustin glared at him, affronted. “You’re the one who almost killed my scientific breakthrough of the century.”

“Well, lucky for you and unlucky for literally the rest of us, the thing’s not dead; it got up and limped away.” Steve crossed his arms. 

“It also tried to kill my daughter,” Karen added, rubbing at her temples. 

Dustin shook his head. “No, that one wasn’t mine; mine’s an adolescent, that one was an adult. That one was the one that terrorized Will and Eleven.”

“Great,” Karen replied, sounding strangled. “Very reassuring.”

Nancy felt Jonathan tensing under her and realized that if he could feel all their emotions, this was probably super overwhelming for him.

She took a few deep breaths, trying to project an air of calm for him. “Okay, well, it doesn’t matter cuz it happened and now we have to deal with it. We’ve got a big monster and a little monster on the loose, maybe more, so step one on the checklist is obviously ‘kill those.’”

“Step two: Close the portal, so nothing else can get through. Or go over there,” Will added, looking down at a cowed Dustin with two raised eyebrows.

“Step Three: Make sure El is safe.” Mike crossed his arms. “Which I’d argue should be step one. We still have no idea where she even _is_!”

Karen nodded. “There is a _child_ out there and in danger, that should be our top priority.”

“Well, we thought she might’ve gone to find her sister,” Nancy suggested. “I mean, of course we’re worried about her, but we don’t really have a lot to go on there.”

“Henry Watts said he gave her a ride to the Greyhound Station on his way to Indianapolis,” the Chief cut in.

Mike scrunched his nose. “She grew up in a lab, how would she know how to use the bus?” 

“Well, he’s the one who suggested it, he told me,” Hopper said with a shrug. “She could’ve hitchhiked from there, but if she took a bus, there’s only a few destinations, and Chicago is the big one.”

“She’s probably safer there than she would be here,” Will suggested. “There are people looking for her here. From the lab. They came by the house this morning.”

“Step three: take care of the people looking for the girl so we can keep her safe,” Joyce said with finality. 

Nancy looked over at Mike, Lucas, and Max. “What about you three? What did you get up to today?”

They glanced at each other. 

“Well, I’m pretty sure my mom is officially leaving Neil,” Max said finally. “It’s not relevant to this whole thing, but it is good news.”

“I said she should join your Divorced Mom’s Club,” Mike added, directing this at Joyce and Karen, plus honorary Divorced Mom Chief Hopper. 

He was only a part of the club because he and Joyce had _history_ , a history that Nancy was dying to uncover, but right now she had bigger mysteries to deal with. 

“Well, that’s good, then.” She nodded approvingly. “And we’ve got our three action items.”

“We’re gonna win this,” Will declared.

“Is that a prophecy?” Dustin asked cheekily.

Will rolled his eyes. “No. I just know we won’t stop until we do.”


	6. Tell The World I'm Coming Home

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The only content warning for this chapter is Murray Bauman, tbh.

“Nancy, no one’s going to buy a story about government conspiracies and psychic kids. You don’t have nearly enough proof,” Steve pointed out. They’d been running through this conversation for close to an hour now, and goddammit, he was tired. And hungry.

“And people won’t want to believe it, anyway,” Jonathan added softly. “Even with all the proof in the world.”

Nancy growled as she paced. “But it’s true!” She sighed. “Okay, well, I _need_ to write this piece. It’s the only way we’ll get the word out and force the government to come cover their asses.”

“It’s supposed to have been shut down for years.” Steve shrugged helplessly. “I don’t know what you expect.”

Nancy stopped abruptly and turned on her heel. “Steve Harrington, you are a genius.”

His eyes widened. “What? What did I say?” It was rare that people referred to his intelligence as anything less than disappointing.

“Nobody will want to believe the United States government is running human experiments. But one rogue doctor? A man whose lab was shut down but kept it running for years? That’s much easier for people to swallow.”

Steve nodded, but he remained unconvinced. “That still doesn’t help with the whole superpowers issue. Which, by the way” - he nodded at Jonathan - “are friggin’ awesome.”

“No, but they will care about the poor, poor woman who was pumped full of drugs and had her baby stolen for more scientific research.” Nancy was grinning wolfishly. 

Steve was in love with her. All of her. Even and especially this side of her. But sometimes it terrified him, too. Like right now, when she was plotting to expose a serious and massive injustice perpetrated by the United States government while she still definitely had a concussion. That didn’t seem safe. 

He shared a long, meaningful look with Jonathan, relieved to get the same look in return. It made his stomach flip, the same way it always did when he looked at or touched or thought about Jonathan. 

Steve had settled his sexuality crisis about six months ago, mostly, after contending with it for a couple years. All by himself, of course - Nancy couldn’t know, Steve knew what people said about bisexual men. He wouldn’t want that for her. But he _was_ bisexual, and he was in love with Jonathan Byers.

He thought of last night and his cheeks involuntarily heated up. God, he’d been stupid. Reckless. Hadn’t believed that Jonathan might have those powers. So they’d said “pick an emotion” and he’d picked horny, thinking about Nancy - but also thinking about Jonathan. It was all a big joke. 

And then Jonathan had _felt_ it and Steve wanted to drop off the face of the earth. He’d said he didn’t know what Steve was thinking, just feeling, but Jonathan was a good guy and he could easily be lying to save Steve the stress and embarrassment. 

“Breathe,” Jonathan whispered, laying his hand on Steve’s shoulder and making it infinitely harder to do so. “It’s okay. We’re all going to be okay.” 

Nancy had a notebook out and was scribbling in it, making plans and scheming. Every time the pen wasn’t on her pad, it was in her mouth as she chewed on the end of it thoughtfully. It was, quite frankly, unfair and distracting. 

“I need to do an interview with Becky Ives,” she decided. 

Steve groaned. “Hasn’t the poor woman been through enough?” He already felt bad about ambushing her at home and dropping life-shattering news on her. ‘By the way, everything your sister said was true, your niece is alive, and she’s got superpowers.’ 

“But she was _angry_ ,” Nancy countered, looking to Jonathan for confirmation. He gave a small nod. “Angry enough to want to do something about it.”

Steve did have to concede that point. He wondered how he’d feel in that situation. Not that he had a sibling, but...just the shock, the betrayal. Hell, he was going through a lot of it just watching all this unfold from here.

“Okay.” He sighed. “Okay. Just...go easy on her, okay?” 

“Of course,” Nancy replied, as if it was silly of him to worry otherwise. Jonathan snorted, which made Steve feel at least somewhat vindicated. Standing opposite Nancy Wheeler was daunting.

Between the two of them, they could handle her. Probably.

A thought occurred to him. “You don’t...plan to go back, do you?” he asked. His car was still in the shop and she was still concussed and also that seemed like a terrible idea. 

She rolled her eyes at him. “No, Steve, I’m going to _call her_. On _the phone_.”

“When did you get her number?”

“On the way out,” Nancy replied easily. “It would’ve been irresponsible not to.”

Oh. Of course. Steve raised his eyebrows incredulously. 

“And,” Nancy continued, “I can expose the men who are responsible for Barb’s death.”

_Oh._

It’d been years, but it was a wound she’d never recovered from. Steve knew that - of course he knew that, they were married - but he still thought of Barb and her disappearance as just...a random tragedy.

“Nancy -” 

She cut him off. “The timing matches too well, Steve.” Because of course she knew exactly what he was going to say. “It’s just a lead. If it doesn’t pan out, then I still get justice for Terry Ives. But if it does…” There was flint in her eyes, and Steve knew he wouldn’t be able to talk her out of it. She’d been hurting for so many years. 

“Okay.” He nodded. “Okay. I support you. How are you going to find out about Barb, though?”

Jonathan and Nancy shared a look. Jonathan seemed far less happy with the plan than she did.

“Not Murray,” he groaned, face twisting in obvious disgust. 

“It’s the best way,” Nancy replied. “I know, I don’t like it either, but come on.”

“Who’s Murray?” Steve demanded, feeling wildly out of the loop.

“An asshole who can’t mind his own business and likes to tell my mom and Hopper they should sleep together. Sometimes in front of Karen,” Jonathan added bitterly. 

None of that helped identify him particularly much, but Steve could see why Jonathan didn’t like the guy.

“He’s a private investigator,” Nancy elaborated. “One of Hopper’s war buddies, from Vietnam - he was a journalist embedded with them. He’s...eccentric. Chases conspiracy theories. When Hopper couldn’t devote many resources to searching for Barb, he connected to Hollands with Murray Bauman. The man built a whole case file, not that anything ever came of it. I mean,” she laughed dryly, “how could anything, considering it’s a whole damn cover-up?”

Steve nodded slowly. “Got it. I can see why you’d think he’s useful, but...Jonathan is an excellent judge of character. You know, even without the whole psychic thing.”

He got an appreciative smile for that one, making his heart kick double time. 

“Oh, Jonathan’s completely right, the man’s insufferable,” Nancy replied, but there was the oddest hint of fondness in her voice. “He’s also a major font of information, and that’s what’s most important.”

So she had her angle, then, and she had her story. Before Steve could say anything else, she was walking out of the living room, presumably to her home office, leaving the two men behind.

Steve looked at Jonathan and then flopped back onto the couch. Jonathan followed much more sedately. 

“You know, I always thought Hawkins was boring, but I guess I was wrong,” he quipped, offering a tired smile. 

“Guess you got the adventure you wanted,” Jonathan replied. 

Steve shook his head. “Nah, man. Boring was fine. I mean - I have everything. I have a good job, a nice house, a nice car.” Steve had a life most people would be envious of. “I have a beautiful, intelligent, driven wife” - who he argues with all the time, who sometimes seems to regret marrying him - “and the best friend a guy could ask for.”

Who he was in love with, completely and irrevocably, but that was fine. He had everything, it was silly to want more. He offered Jonathan what he hoped was a relatively convincing smile.

Jonathan sighed. “I always wanted more, but…” He closed his eyes and tilted his head back towards the ceiling. “Not like this.” 

Steve made an affirmative noise in the back of his throat. He wasn’t stupid; he knew he was much better off than Jonathan. Not necessarily for lack of desire - Steve would pay for Jonathan’s university happily, but he also knew better than to offer. 

“Well, maybe this is the start of something,” Steve finally answered. “Maybe...once we fix...all this” - he waved his hands, because he had no idea how to encapsulate it otherwise - “maybe it’ll lead to some good and less conspiracy-shit.”

Steve wasn’t sure how convincing he’d managed to sound. They sat there in silence, the inches between them on the couch feeling like a whole ocean. 

Jonathan broke it first. “You know, I failed the first semester of university.”

Steve startled. “No, I didn’t.” He’d thought Jonathan had come home out of an obligation to his family. And the finances, of course.

“Yeah. I - the school psychologist called it a nervous breakdown. I was so stressed, all the time, and angry and sad and manic sometimes - but it didn’t feel like it was _me_.” He sighed, raking a hand through his floppy hair. “I failed because I couldn’t keep it together, and then it wasn’t worth wasting the money on me.”

“I’m sure it wasn’t your fault, man,” Steve answered nearly automatically. “I know you did the best you could. You should - you shouldn’t give up.”

“That’s the thing,” Jonathan sighed. “Now I - I think it _wasn’t_ my fault. I went to Chicago, right? There’s like, two million people there.” Steve whistled. Hawkins was as big as he’d ever really thought about. “And you know - well, how it seems like apparently I can feel other people’s emotions?”

Steve nodded. “An empath.” Jonathan stared at him in surprise. “What? I’ve read a superhero comic or two in my life.” Also Will had said it last night, but he wasn’t going to diminish his credibility.

That earned him a smile, and god it was beautiful. “Right. An empath. Well, I think maybe - I think I was feeling everyone’s emotions around me, and I couldn’t handle it. I mean, the stress of hundreds of college students, and then the people living around them, and…” He threw his hands out helplessly. “I don’t even know the range of this thing. I don’t -”

“Hey.” Steve reached out to grab Jonathan’s hand, squeezing it. “We’ve got the rest of forever to figure it out, okay? You and me, and you know you couldn’t keep Nancy away if you tried.” He smiled crookedly. “I will help you do weird science-y shit and I will determine what kind of crazy awesome superhero my best friend is and I will help him reach his full potential.”

Jonathan laughed bitterly. “I’m hardly a superhero.”

Steve shrugged. “Well, for what it’s worth, you are to me.”

That earned a blush from Jonathan, but a smile too, and he whispered, “It’s worth a lot, actually.”

* * *

Kali wasn’t sure if she should be concerned that Jane was still sleeping.

She was, at her core, not prepared to raise a twelve year old. Never had she been more thankful to be a lesbian than these past few days - she hadn’t dated a woman who could accidentally get her pregnant as of yet. And she was pretty sure Mick was _the one_ so far as monogamist ideals and romance went, so she didn’t intend to find one either. 

“She’s a child, not a hand grenade,” Dottie scolded. “Quit chewing your nails, you’re gonna make yourself bleed again.” Hypocritical, considering Dottie’s nails were _also_ bitten down to the quick. 

Kali rolled her eyes. “It’s after noon,” she pointed out. 

“Well, the girl had a big night last night,” Dottie replied with a shrug, painting the bitten stubs of her nails a neon yellow. “First time committing vigilante justice and all that. That’s enough to knock a kid out for the count. Want some?” she asked, gesturing with the pot of polish. 

Kali shook her head and was about to decline with some sort of sarcastic comment when the lightbulbs shattered and she heard an ear-splitting scream. She swore. She’d been right; something was wrong with Jane. 

She climbed the ladder to the second floor at double speed, relaxing marginally when she saw Funshine holding Jane to his chest, petting her hair soothingly. Now there was a man designed to be someone’s older brother. 

“What’s wrong?” Kali asked Jane brusquely. “Are you hurt?”

Jane shook her head. “Bad men.”

“Yes, we fought a bad man last night.” Kali nodded. “But he’s gone now, he won’t hurt you anymore.”

Jane shook her head again, harder. “ _No._ I saw - bad men. Hurt friends.”

“Your friends in Hawkins?” Fun asked, which impressed Kali because she had been stumped as to who the friends could be.

Jane nodded, teary-eyed. “Papa,” she breathed, making Kali’s blood run cold. 

There was a place In-Between worlds that Kali visited sometimes. There were theoretically other worlds on other sides, which Kali had caught glimpses of, but never much more. Brenner had tried to get her to open a portal through there to another world, back in the day, when it was just one of the crazy hypotheses he possessed, like that pumping a pregnant woman full of LSD would give her baby superpowers or some shit. She’d never succeeded, but Terry had.

Now, she found herself accidentally slipping into it in her sleep. 

“The monsters,” Jane added, shaking like a leaf. 

Of course Brenner tried to get Jane to go In-Between. Of course she learned to watch. Of course it haunted her.

Dreaming of the In-Between place was strange. It was like watching lions at a zoo, part of some world you’d never understand and kept from you by a pane of glass. Kali had dreamt of Hawkins once in those twelve years, and it was less than a week ago; she saw a young man, not much younger than her, trapped and wandering. 

On the other side of the glass, a gazelle in with the lions.

“Jane,” Kali began carefully. “Do you dream of the In-Between place?” She had no idea how Brenner had trained the girl, or what lasting effects there were.

Jane nodded vehemently. “ _Bad_ place,” she added. 

“Is that what you dreamed about now?” Jane looked at her helplessly instead of answering, so Kali changed tactics. “What _did_ you see?”

“Mike,” she said, with a wavering voice. “Will.” Names that meant nothing to Kali. “Papa.” That one did. “He - hurt them.”

Mick had joined up to see what was happening, a cut on her forehead where lightbulb glass had caught her. She looked meaningfully at Kali and gestured her to the side. Kali followed wordlessly.

“It doesn’t sound real.” Mick crossed her arms, quiet enough to make sure Jane wouldn’t overhear her.

Kali shrugged, agreeing, but, “It is possible.”

“It is, but unlikely. How would Brenner even find them?” Kali raised an eyebrow at her. “Right, okay, stupid question, dude’s evil and rich. But I’m just saying, this sounds like a case of trauma nightmares to me. Cuz she can’t see the future, right?”

“Not so far as I’m aware,” Kali replied. That’d be a nifty skill to have on their side. 

“Right. So why would Brenner and these two guys be on the Other Side right now?” Mick sighed. “The girl needs therapy.”

Kali barked out a laugh. “Right, cuz we have therapy money.” Mick had said the same thing about her a few years back, and here Kali was, doing just fine. 

“I’ll figure something out,” Mick replied, with a shortness indicating she was frustrated at Kali for exactly the thing Kali had been thinking about. It was the only thing Mick ever got frustrated with her about - not taking care of herself, as if it was worth it to try. “For now, let’s explain that the dream wasn’t real.”

They returned to where Funshine was brushing soft circles on Jane’s back, making soothing noises. 

“Jane,” Mick began carefully. “You know how you grew up in a scary place, with people who hurt you?”

Jane nodded, tentative. “Papa.”

“Right. So sometimes, when you go through something terrifying” - Jane’s face scrunched in confusion at the word - “sorry, that means extra scary. When you go through something extra scary, your brain tries to process it while you sleep. So you have scary dreams. But they aren’t real.”

Jane appeared doubtful. “Mike...safe?”

Kali nodded with more conviction than the situation deserved, but it was the truth when she said, “I don’t think Papa has found him.”

Jane sat, mulling this over, nestled tight against Funshine. He was watching the two women with a raised eyebrow, but he trusted them - “with my life,” he’d always remind them - so he let them talk. 

“Wanna see,” she said finally. 

“Hm?” Funshine rubbed her shoulder. “Wanna see what?”

“Go home.”

Ah. She wanted to go back to Hawkins, to check on her friends. Make sure they were safe.

Kali’s heart did a flip. Mick and Funshine, caring and sensible, were both staring at her with open concern, but she’d always planned to go back. From the very beginning, she’d promised herself she’d kill Brenner and stop this shit once and for all. And Jane hadn’t told her not to.

She’d spent years practicing her skills, but also feeding the fires of her rage. She’d turned her fear into strength, her anger into fuel, her pain into a plan. Every nightmare reminded her of her intention, every time she woke up screaming in Mick’s arms cemented her resolve. 

She had always planned to go back. Now was as good of a time as any.

Kali mustered all the confidence she could and stood up. “Alright, pack your bags, then. We’re going on a road trip.”

* * *

Murray liked to say he lived in a secret bunker, and he refused to tell Nancy where it was, even though she’d asked at the last two family gatherings he’d attended, two and five years ago. But this time, she had an ace to play. 

“Murray,” she greeted. 

“Nancy Wheeler,” he replied, because he had a penchant for melodrama. 

“I’ve got a break in the case,” she replied, cutting straight to the chase. 

He hissed. “Damn you, Wheeler.”

“You gonna tell me how to find you or not?” Nancy demanded impatiently. She knew he’d refuse to talk about it over the phone; he’d been pulling that move long before Mike had. She knew he wouldn’t be able to resist.

He let out a strangled noise of frustration. “Fine. Grab a pen.”

“Already got one. What am I, an amatuer?” 

“‘Course not,” he said, almost proudly, and then he launched into an annoyingly complicated cipher. Nancy didn’t bother asking him to repeat because she knew he wouldn’t, so she just prayed she’d taken down the bits well enough to figure it out. “See you, Wheeler.”

He hung up before she could say goodbye. She rolled her eyes. 

He didn’t tell her to “Burn it when you’re done” this time. She wondered if he assumed she was just used to that by now, and for the briefest moment she debated making him regret it before she got to work cracking his stupid cipher.

Twenty minutes later - and it was only twenty because Murray had been doing this shit for years, so it was old hat - Nancy had an address and a headache. Originally, she’d intended to drive there and back herself, but unfortunately it seemed she’d have to concede Steve was right about the whole injury thing.

“Jonathan,” she demanded, not bothering to knock on the door to the guest room he’d stayed in the night before. “We’re going to visit Murray.”

Jonathan groaned. “We don’t even know where he lives,” he protested. Nancy flashed the sheet of paper. “Fuck, okay. Fine.”

“Steve! We need the car!” she shouted, not bothering to wonder where he was in the house. 

“It’s still in the shop!” he shouted back. She heard pounding footsteps as he hurried over. “Said we should get it back by the end of the day. Besides, I thought we agreed you weren’t going anywhere!”

“I just said I wasn’t driving back to interview Becky Ives,” she pointed out. “And I didn’t, I did it over the phone.”

“So what’s this for?”

“I need to go see Murray.”

“That weird journalist guy you both seem to sort of hate?” 

“That’s the one, yeah.” Nancy nodded. “Also, I don’t hate him.”

“I kind of do,” Jonathan mumbled. “Depending on the day.”

Steve snorted. “And why do you need to see him in person?”

“He’s got notes for me. Can’t share ‘em over the phone or fax, cuz it’s not secure. Also he said there’s way too many of them.” Nancy nearly bounced on her toes with excitement. He hadn’t said that this time, of course, but he’d definitely said it before.

As long as she’d known Murray, she’d known about The Wall. She’d never _seen_ The Wall, but she knew it existed, and on it was everything he could find about Barb’s disappearance and weird things about Hawkins in general. He’d guessed a few years back that the lab was sketchy, though at the time Nancy had written it off as paranoia. 

She supposed she probably owed him a bottle of tequila now. 

The thing about The Wall was that even after Barb’s parents stopped paying Murray, he was haunted by the case. He kept digging. 

This was twelve years of research, and Nancy was finally going to see it. 

“Fine, but we don’t have a car.” Steve shrugged. 

“We’ll take Jonathan’s,” Nancy decided, raising her eyebrow at the bedraggled squeak she got in return. “What? We can just walk, exercise is good.”

“You’re insane, Nancy Wheeler.” Steve rolled his eyes, but he leaned in to kiss her with a hand on the back of her head. “You’re insane and I love you.”

Jonathan was blushing and awkward again (like always, like always, Nancy thought) but she managed to herd him out of the house without much trouble, even though she was the concussed one. 

Steve followed, locking the door.

“What are you doing?” she demanded. 

Steve raised an eyebrow. “Walking to Jonathan’s house?”

“No. No, no.” There were surely things Nancy wanted to happen less than Murray meeting Steve, but right now she was hard pressed to think of any of them. “No, you’re staying here.”

Steve snorted. “Like hell I am.” He looked to Jonathan for support.

Jonathan, however, didn’t want Steve meeting Murray either, she knew. It would’ve been like Mike’s episode but a million times worse. “Steve…”

But Jonathan was also _far_ more susceptible to Steve’s pleading face than Nancy was, so in the end, Steve wound up coming along. 

Jonathan drove, and Steve sat beside him in the front seat singing along to the radio, even though Jonathan had picked and it was Nirvana right now. Steve was also in charge of navigating, and he had the map stretched in his lap, but Nancy’s brain was so far away from the present it made no difference to her. She just stared out the window at the greenery and fields of Indiana and she thought.

_“Cut the bullshit.” It was a bold thing to say to two twenty-year-olds, especially on Thanksgiving, especially when he never saw them otherwise. “You know you like each other.”_

_Nancy had pointed at her left hand, the diamond winking in the kitchen lights. “I’m engaged.”_

_He’d laughed like it didn’t matter, and he’d been right. It didn’t matter, because that didn’t stop her from being in love with Jonathan, from being a terrible girlfriend and soon to be terrible wife._

She _really_ wasn’t looking forward to Murray meeting Steve.

She saw more than heard Jonathan lean over and mutter something to Steve, and then Steve twisted around and put his hand on her knee. “I love you, Nance.”

“I know,” she replied with a twinge. “I love you too.”

“And I’m so happy to have you in my life, as my friend and my wife. I’m so lucky.”

Somehow, that only made Nancy feel worse. She offered him a weak smile. “Thank you, Steve.”

“I mean it,” he emphasized, squeezing her knee. “There’s nothing - there’s nothing you could ever say or do that would make me love you any less. I promise.”

And he said it with such conviction, too, that for a moment she thought about telling him, but she just kept on smiling weakly and went back to staring out the window. 

Murray’s house really was a bunker, with only about twenty square feet above ground. It was the middle of goddamn nowhere, too, even more so than the rest of Indiana, and she felt the tension in her soul ratcheting up in the eerie stillness, broken only by an occasional bug. 

It had been a couple years since Murray had deigned to visit, but when he threw open the door, he was just as Nancy remembered. 

“My, my, Nancy Wheeler! How you’ve grown!” 

“Murray Bauman,” she replied flatly. “You’re exactly the same.”

He laughed. “There’s that wit I know and love. Jonathan Byers, good to see you, and -” He broke off and looked Steve up and down slowly, a Cheshire grin spreading as he did so. “Well, then, you must be the husband. Steven, was it?”

“Steve,” he corrected, and then he looked over to Nancy with a crease in his eyebrows that seemed to tell her that he understood now. 

“Steve Wheeler - Oh, no, I’m sure you have a name of your own, but come now, we all know what Nancy’s like,” he added before Steve could correct him again. “I take it you’re the proud purchaser of that _very_ nice rock she wears? The symbol of _love_ and _commitment_ and _fidelity_?”

Nancy had said she didn’t hate Murray, but she was reevaluating her stance currently.

“Murray. Focus,” she ground out.

He snorted. “Sweetheart, I’ve been working on this case for twelve years, five minutes isn’t going to make one bit of difference.” He did up seven locks on the door and ushered them deeper into his cramped little abode. “This case is colder than Mrs. Claus’ bed on Christmas Eve.”

“I told you I had a break,” Nancy replied snappishly.

“Yes, that’s what you said. Whether that’s true remains to be seen, my investigative protégée.”

“Then show me the damn board.”

“Of course, of course, madam.” And then he had his hand on her elbow, leading her grandly through his shitty tiny doomsday home and prattling on as if it was a grand tour.

The Wall was, however, just as glorious as she’d imagined.

It truly was the whole wall, covered in newspaper clippings and a giant map of Indiana, then another, smaller map of Hawkins, pictures of Barb and Nancy and the lab and everything and even strings criss-crossing the wall, connecting various seemingly independent bits into a collage that made perfect sense to Murray. 

And, though she hated it whenever he brought up how similar they were, made perfect sense to Nancy, too.

“Christ,” she muttered, finding an article about MKUltra. “How did you even - none of this shit seemed connected…”

“Hawkins, Indiana is a strange town, sweetheart. Every time I answer a question, three more emerge; every time I flip a rock, I find another rabbit hole to descend.” He spread his hands wide. “It may not look it, but everything is connected. Your friend Barbara -”

“Barb,” Nancy corrected automatically, having had this argument for years. 

“Yes, well, we know she didn’t just run away with some boy and we know she didn’t turn up anywhere else. I assure you, this is the only explanation.”

“Timeline’s wrong,” Nancy said simply, unpinning the articles about Barb and the small snippet about Terry Ives’ ‘miscarriage’ from some obituary paper. “Barb and I met Terry before she started the study, and she had her baby right before Barb disappeared. Her daughter’s not actually dead, by the way.” She switched them around to better suit what actually happened. “How did you even find all this, anyway?”

“Twelve years is a long time, Nancy.” Murray was staring at her in surprise now, the patronizing aura slipping for a second. “Why did you never tell me you met Terry Ives?”

“Because you never once mentioned her and I had no idea it might be important until less than a week ago?” Nancy raised her eyebrows.

“Right, right.” He shook his head. “And you say her daughter is alive? How did you find that?”

“Met her. Brenner” - Nancy tapped the MKUltra article - “faked her miscarriage and ran experiments on the girl for 12 years.”

Murray whistled. “The whole time I’ve been searching…”

“Yep.” Nancy pulled out her notebook. “And I’m writing an article to expose him.”

Murray made an appreciative noise in the back of his throat. “My little girl, all grown up.” He wiped away a fake tear.

“I’m not your little girl.” She rolled her eyes but didn’t bother sparing him a glance as she picked details and leads off the wall. “But yes, this is the story that’s going to get me published.”

“Well, when you’ve got something, you know I’ve got friends in high places. Give me a holler.”

Nancy was dimly aware of Murray shuffling Steve and Jonathan out of the room, but she wasn’t done with her notes yet. She kept scribbling anything that jumped out at her until all of a sudden, her hand stilled. 

It was a picture of her and Barb. They were grinning, the both of them, so undeniably full of life. Nancy couldn’t help tracing her finger across Barb’s cheek, even knowing what Jonathan would say about the oils of her skin on the photo paper.

Finally, finally, Nancy was almost at the end. 

“I’m sorry,” she whispered, not for the first time. But hopefully, hopefully - it could be the last.

* * *

“Precognition, trial seven,” Dustin said into the recorder. 

Mike threw a wad of paper at him. “Shut up, man.”

Lucas was trying to tune them both out, and he hoped Will was having more success than he was. “Okay,” he said calmly, quietly. “I want you to focus on what it feels like when you have a premonition. Think about all the different sensations in your body, think about your emotions...how do you feel relative to the outside world?”

He waited a few minutes in silence, relieved when Will gave a tense nod. “Okay, now I want you to think about all those feelings, and I want you to put them on a path just in front of you.” Will nodded again. “Now slowly move towards it. Seek them out.”

It seemed like it might be working, finally, before Will’s shoulders slumped. “It’s not - that doesn’t feel right. It doesn’t feel possible.” 

Lucas nodded patiently. He was used to setbacks and struggles. When he’d done his clinical hours at a practice on the South Side, he’d had a lot of people for whom he’d had to work doubly hard. The field of psychology wasn’t particularly culturally responsive, nor did it always seem to actually align with the experiences of the people who filled out the DSM checklists. 

“When you say it doesn’t feel possible, do you mean that in a defeated sort of way, or in a ‘breathing underwater’ sort of way?” Lucas asked. 

Will tilted his head and appraised. “Breathing underwater. It’s not - I don’t -” He took a deep breath, centering himself. “I can keep trying this again and again, but I don’t think the power works like that.”

“You can breathe underwater if you have a snorkel,” Lucas suggested gently. “So maybe we can find a different way, the way that does work.”

Will exhaled slowly. “Yeah. Yeah, okay.”

“Want to try again?” Lucas asked.

Will shook his head. “Let’s do something else.”

“You should see if you can move things with your mind, the way Eleven can,” Mike suggested. “That’d be a pretty neat skill.”

Will looked at him helplessly. “I don’t even know how I’d start trying that.”

Lucas reached over to squeeze his hand. “Hey, that’s why we’re working on it together, okay?”

He was aware of Max in his periphery, climbing a tree, and Mike behind him throwing more paper. It was impossible to be _unaware_ of Dustin, what with the amount of movement inherent to his state of being, but Lucas was trying. He wanted to focus on Will.

This was the whole reason he’d gone into psychology in the first place. Maybe he hadn’t expected the whole psychic powers thing, but he wanted to help people. And Will was a good friend and a good person, so Lucas was going to help him. 

Somehow. Even if he had no powers of his own to speak of. 

“Okay, well. Close your eyes and tell me what you feel,” Lucas directed.

“Telekinesis, trial one.”

“Dustin, shut _up_!”

“Proper documentation is important for the scientific process, Michael!”

Will popped one eye open. “I feel disturbed.”

Mike jabbed his finger in Dustin’s direction. “Told you!”

“Nuh uh, it’s you who’s disturbing him!”

Lucas was a very self-actualized man. He knew he was in love with Mike Wheeler. He knew he loved Dustin Henderson like a brother. 

He knew he wanted them to shut the fuck up, so he told them such. 

“Sorry,” Mike mumbled, looking cowed, and Lucas almost wanted to pull him into a hug because he’d never been very good at tolerating the sad Mike face, but he was on a mission here.

“Okay, try again.”

Will closed his eyes and took a few deep breaths. “What am I supposed to be feeling?”

“Well, this is just conjecture, but I’d imagine you’d have to be able to perceive something before you can move it,” Lucas reasoned, resting his hands on his knees. 

“I can perceive lots of things,” Will returned. “Even with my eyes closed.”

Right. Of course. “No, I mean.” Lucas stopped and wiggled his hands helplessly. “ _Perceive_. Like, feel a connection to. The same way you’d feel a connection to a tennis ball in your hand.”

“What does that even mean?” Dustin demanded. 

“If you don’t shut up, I’m making Max take you away somewhere,” Lucas threatened. 

“Why?” Dustin frowned. 

“Because they’re the only one who’s not bothering us.”

“Where?” Mike asked, knowing full well he was included in this.

“Wherever they want. Max has complete authority and I’ll give them my keys.”

“The quarry.” He didn’t have to look at Max to see them smiling wickedly. It still made his heart skip, the same way it did back in high school.

He snorted. “Fine. Just don’t scratch up my car.”

“I know what you mean,” Will cut in, getting the conversation back on track. “But nothing feels like that. It’s all - there’s space between me and everything else around me. A buffer of some sort.” He opened his eyes, exhaling slowly. “I’m not going to be able to hold onto anything.”

Lucas nodded. This wasn’t one he could be particularly useful with, anyway; maybe when Eleven came back - if she came back - the girl would be able to help Will. 

“You should try and read feelings, like Jonathan!” Dustin suggested. Then, “Empathy, Trial one.”

Will glanced at Lucas and said sardonically, “Well, he’s feeling annoyed.”

Dustin squawked in annoyance. “That’s cheating!”

“Okay, okay.” Will laughed and offered Dustin a small smile. “You are...curious, and excited. Your scientific attention has been caught and you’re all in, now. You’ll follow it to the end of wherever it takes you.”

Dustin grinned. “Now that’s much better. How did it feel?”

Will laughed again, eyes crinkling at the corners. Lucas was relieved to see him smile. “Dustin, it wasn’t psychic, I just know you well.”

“Oh.” Instead of seeming disappointed, Dustin just gave a dopey grin. “That’s cool too.”

Lucas rolled his eyes. Lovesick idiot. 

Max swung themself down from the tree, landing gracefully, and made it over to Lucas in three strides. “We’ve got company.”

“The lab?” Lucas demanded, already pushing himself to his feet. Eleven wasn’t here, but he didn’t trust the sketchy organization not to come after Will now. 

They shook their head. “It looks...well, you’ll have to see for yourself, it’s one intense looking van.” 

The five of them made it to the front of the Byers house at the same time as Karen pushing her way out the door. “What on _earth_?” she demanded. 

Lucas couldn’t tell her. There was a black van, more beat-up duct tape and homemade repairs than the original car left, barreling its way down the road towards the house. It had an intense anarchic energy, and something about it prickled the edges of Lucas’ memory. He felt like he’d seen it before, but of course, he’d gone to school in Chicago. Plenty of opportunities to see an old, beat-up van.

Holly pushed her way out onto the porch, too. “Whoa.”

The van kept going at a frankly terrifying pace until it came to a sudden, lurching halt on the gravel driveway. The first one out of the van was a pretty black girl, just a bit older than Lucas, who doubled over and heaved. 

“Fuck you, Axel, I’m never letting you drive again!” she shouted. 

The white guy with a giant, colorful mohawk that clambered out of the driver’s door had to be Axel, then. “Aw, c’mon, Mick, it wasn’t that bad!”

“You were terrible,” deadpanned the Indian girl who’d followed Mick out and was rubbing her back slowly. “You’re lucky Jane plays favorites.” 

And then, to everyone’s shock, Eleven clambered out of the van.

“Mike!” she shrieked, and then barrelled into him like a neon-and-leather cannonball. 

Mike gasped out a laugh, arms coming to wrap around the young girl. “Hey, El.” He looked down at her so soft and fond that Lucas couldn’t help but melt a little bit. _God_ , why did Mike have to be so impossibly adorable at all times?

Max was standing beside him, smiling softly, and Lucas knew they were thinking the same thing. Occasionally, the past few days had felt like high school all over again, the three of them in some sort of orbit Mike couldn’t see, Max didn’t want to acknowledge, and Lucas wasn’t interested in escaping.

The next shriek was “Will!” and a cannonball of much less momentum, given that Will was just a couple feet from Mike and also slightly less scrawny. 

“Hey, kiddo.” He ruffled their buzz cut with a smile. “I made it back.”

She nodded solemnly, looking up at him with big eyes. “Mike saved you.”

“Mmhmm. Mike and Dustin and Max and Lucas. And I’m safe now, and so are you.”

She shook her head sharply. “Not safe.”

“No?” Will asked, eyebrows knitting. 

“Papa.” Then she turned. “Hi Holly!” 

“Hi El!” The two pre-teens waved at each other excitedly and in spite of the terribly inappropriate timing, Lucas’ brain chose now to remind him how bad he wanted kids. Even kids who say ominous things and then immediately turn around brightly. 

“She was worried Brenner had hurt them,” Mick explained, coming around to stand close to their group. “She wouldn’t believe us that it was just a dream, so we brought her back here to confirm it.”

Seeing as no one else was making any move to, Lucas decided to start off the introductions. “Lucas Sinclair.”

“I’m Mick,” she replied. “That’s Axel” - the guy with the mohawk - “Kali” - the Indian girl who’d been rubbing her back - “Funshine” - a large black man who’d emerged from the back of the van - “and Dottie. Where’s Dottie?” Mick glanced around. 

“I’m here!” shouted a poof of blonde curls as she fell backwards out of the van. “Ouch.”

“Dumbass,” Mick snorted, but fondly. “And it seems like you all already know Jane.”

“Eleven?” Mike asked.

“ _Don’t_ call her that,” Kali snapped, eyes flaring. “Her name is Jane Ives.”

Lucas was still slightly confused, but he was pretty sure he knew where these folks had come from. “You’re the sister?” he asked, following his hunch.

Kali nodded. “Same lab. I escaped not long after she was born. I was held there with her mother.”

She probably had a number, too, once upon a time. Lucas could guess that’s probably why she was touchy about it. 

“Mike, Will, Dustin, Max,” Lucas rattled off in return, pointing at each. “Karen, Mike’s mom” - he pointed at the porch, then beside her - “and Holly, his little sister.”

Mick nodded. “Sorry to barge in on you, ma’am,” she called, the picture of politeness. “We just really wanted Jane to feel secure.”

Karen waved her hand airily, and anyone but Lucas would’ve missed the tension in her shoulders. “I’m just glad to know she’s safe. Can I get you all anything to drink?”

“I’d die for a cup of coffee,” Dottie replied, slumping against the van. “Please and thanks.”

Mick’s smile grew strained for a moment. “I’m sure we could all use some water, if it’s not too much trouble.”

Karen nodded. “Why don’t you all come inside, then?”

* * *

Holly had called him to tell him to come home with Nancy, that Mom (Karen) was freaking out and that she needed support. She hadn’t told Jonathan _why_ Karen was freaking out, only that she was, so as he pulled up to the house with Steve and Nancy in tow, he was more than a bit blindsided by the giant black van parked in their driveway. 

If he focused, he could feel five unfamiliar sets of feelings inside the house, along with everyone he already knew. Jeez, it was getting crowded in there.

“What the hell?” Nancy demanded.

He shrugged helplessly, just as clueless as she was.

“Was your mom expecting anyone?” Steve asked, though Jonathan wasn’t sure whose mom was being referred to in the moment. 

Nancy raised an eyebrow. “Who would any of us know that drives something like _that_?” She jerked her thumb at the van, which looked like it was one cough away from falling apart and had spray paint on the sides. 

Well, there was one way to find out.

Jonathan pushed open the door and found strangers on most surfaces in his home. The first one to speak was an Indian girl with dark purple in her hair and arresting eyes. “You must be the brother.”

“Uh. Yes.” He certainly was A Brother, and the only brother of anyone in the room. Will waved. “I’m Jonathan.”

“Kali Prasad. Your brother tells me that you are like us.” He stared at her blankly, so she elaborated. “Talented.”

Jonathan laughed dryly. “That’s one way of putting it.” He’d never considered it a talent so much as a survival mechanism - it’d been very useful when Lonnie was still around, to sense his dangerous moods, and then to be there to support his mother during her depressive episodes. 

But this girl called it a talent.

Nancy pushed her way forward. “You’re the other girl from the lab, aren’t you?” she demanded. “The one there at the same time as Terry?”

Jonathan could feel the girl tense and the flare of rage that went through her, and it sparked some sort of deep recognition inside him. “What do you know about Terry? Or about me?”

“I’m writing an article on the lab,” Nancy replied. “Human experimentation. Can I interview you?”

Oh, Christ.

Kali snorted. “That’s not going to accomplish anything.”

“Not necessarily,” Nancy insisted. “I’ve got the angle, I’ll make it work.”

Kali rolled her eyes, but the girl next to her put a hand on her shoulder. The girlfriend, if Jonathan was reading these feelings correctly. 

“Fine,” Kali acquiesced. “But I maintain it is a fool’s errand.”

“Perfect, thank you so much!”

Nancy whisked Kali into the kitchen, and the girlfriend followed. Jonathan took the opportunity to leave the spot on the couch they’d vacated, and Steve slid in next to him, pressing up close.

“Not exactly the quiet night you’d hoped for, huh?” he asked Steve softly.

Steve shrugged. “There are worse ways I can think of to spend a Wednesday night,” he replied, giving Jonathan a reassuring smile that made his stomach flip. His eyes strayed to Steve’s lips.

God, it was getting bad. One of these days he was going to do something to embarrass himself and ruin the whole life he’d built for himself. 

Will came in to save him, nudging his knee. He raised one eyebrow and Jonathan felt his face get hot. 

“Kali offered to train me,” Will said, looking up at Jonathan from where he sat on the floor. “We tried this afternoon but it didn’t really work because no one knew what to do. But she’s got powers, like Jane and like me. So I figure…” He trailed off, staring at Jonathan like he expected his older brother to know exactly what he meant. 

And Jonathan did, whether by empathy or just plain big brother sense. He nodded. “I think that’s a good idea.”

“You could probably ask her to train you too, if you want,” Will suggested. “She could help.”

Jonathan shrugged. “I don’t really want to be trained. I don’t want to...do anything with this.”

“She can teach you to block people out, though,” Will replied. His brown eyes were impossibly big. “So next time you go to the city, it doesn’t hurt.”

Jonathan startled. “You knew about that?”

A delicate, one-shouldered shrug. “I had an inkling. It never really made sense when you said you just didn’t like it. And you’re not the kind of person who fails.”

That earned a bitter laugh. “I am exactly the kind of person who fails,” he retorted, taking quick stock of his life with his dead-end job in a town that hated him, the fact he still lived with his mother, the fact he was in love with his two best friends…

Will shook his head. “Not when it matters.”

Jonathan felt his face growing uncomfortably hot again. Rather than answer, he jerked his chin towards Lucas, engaged in conversation with the girl - Jane Ives, apparently officially - and taking notes every once in a while. “What’s going on with that?” 

“Mick asked him to work with Jane.” Jonathan must’ve looked very confused, because Will elaborated unprompted. “Kali’s girlfriend. She said - well, it was a long and private conversation, but the gist of it was that when she found out Lucas was a psychologist, she asked him to do something because she knows how bad that lab can mess people up.”

It must’ve been Kali she was thinking about. Jonathan wondered about them, how long they’d been together, how they’d met. If Mick had powers, and if she didn’t, how did she handle being with someone who did?

Lucas was a good man. Jonathan had always known that. Hopefully, he could be a good man for Jane, and maybe Kali too, if Jonathan was reading the subtext of Will’s words right. He’d had a _normal_ fucked up childhood, he couldn’t imagine how much worse of a place he’d be in if his dad was more than just an abusive drunk. 

Kali came up behind him, startling him as she put a hand on his shoulder. “Your girlfriend is a force of nature,” she said blithely.

Speaking of.

Jonathan’s cheeks colored. “She’s not my -” He looked at Steve for help.

“She’s my wife,” Steve added tentatively.

Kali raised an eyebrow. “So?” Both men spluttered. “Anyway, I still think it’s bullshit, but if anyone can get the word out, it’s this girl. So you’ve got powers too. What sort?” Her quick change of topic gave Jonathan whiplash. 

“Uh, yeah. Empathy.”

Kali snorted. “Damn, I know a few people who could use normal amounts of that power.” She shook her head. “I’m gonna train your brother tomorrow. I don’t know how much I can do for you with the whole…” She traced her hand in a large circle in the air. “But if you want me to try, ask now.”

“Tomorrow for me too?” Jonathan asked, just to confirm.

“Probably not.” She tilted her head, considering. “Your brother’s going to take all day, and I’ve got a few errands I’d like to run. But I can stick around, at least for a couple more days.”

Jonathan nodded appreciatively. “Yeah, that sounds good.”

“I make no promises,” she said flatly. “Just so we’re clear. I’m by no means an expert; the only advantage I have is that I know what it’s supposed to feel like.”

Jonathan nodded again. “Understood.” If he went in with low expectations, not even nothing could disappoint him.

She walked away without saying goodbye. Her emotions felt like steel; they had since the first moment he’d perceived her. They were cold like steel too, though not unkind. 

He spotted Nancy conversing with Lucas, hard at work taking more notes - about what, Jonathan couldn’t guess, but everything was always work for her. She dotted the last note with a flourish and beamed at Lucas, then made her way over to Jonathan and Steve. 

“You wanna get out of here?” she asked. “I’ve got everything I need.”

In spite of the sheer amount of time they’d spent together in the last few days, Jonathan still ached to see them go. He glanced away awkwardly. “Good night, then.”

“No, you’re coming with.” He looked back at Nancy. “Mom was freaking out about the number of people in the house and where Jane would sleep, so I told her Jane could use your room and you could just stay with us longer. I hope that’s okay?” she added, mostly as an afterthought. She didn’t even look at Steve so it had to be directed at Jonathan.

He swallowed thickly. “Yeah. Yeah, that’s okay. Let me just...grab some more clean clothes.”

It’d been a couple days since he last shaved, and he was starting to get a little scruffy, so Jonathan grabbed his razor at the same time as a couple changes of clothes. Hopefully more than one wasn’t presumptuous, but...there was really no telling how long this would last, and he wanted to be prepared. 

He managed to slip out with only minor fussing from his mother, a kiss on both cheeks for good luck or something, and then he was sliding into the driver’s seat of his car, which already had Nancy and Steve in it. He deflated.

“Yeah, there are a lot of people in there,” Steve said sympathetically, reaching out to rub Jonathan’s shoulder, every touch like electricity. “But it’s okay, we’re going home now, and it’s gonna be just us.”

Jonathan nodded, not trusting himself to speak, and backed out onto the road. 

The drive was easy and monster-less, which was how Jonathan preferred his drives, and he opened their front door with his spare key and ushered the two of them inside. 

_“You have a key to their house?”_ Will had asked once, but it was totally normal best friend stuff and it definitely came in handy, like right now. 

Steve yawned widely. “What do you say we call it, team?” He rubbed a hand across his face. “Sleep?”

Nancy shook her head. “I’m finishing this story tonight. No matter what. You can sleep, though.”

Steve shook his head. “Nah, if you’re staying up, I’m staying up with you.” His eyes flashed with supportive defiance. 

He lasted twenty minutes before he was asleep on the couch. Jonathan smiled fondly and pulled a blanket over him, and then he went into the kitchen. Nancy hadn’t acknowledged either of them since she said they could sleep, and now Steve was out, so Jonathan had to find something to entertain himself that wasn’t staring at Nancy and thinking about how beautiful she was. 

So he made coffee. He knew where everything in this kitchen lived just as well as his own, and he knew that Nancy took her coffee with just a bit of cream this time of night. He knew everything he needed to.

When he placed the mug in front of her, she glanced up appreciatively at him. “You’re a saint.”

He snorted. “Hardly.” He peered at the article she was writing. “Wait, you’re almost done.” Nancy nodded, and he whistled. “God, you’re impressive.”

“Lucas gave me the last little bit of the historical context I needed to round it all out,” she explained. “After that, it was easy.”

Jonathan laughed. “I doubt that,” he replied. “But you’re Nancy Wheeler; you can make anything easy.”

* * *

Mike liked riding on the back of Max’s motorcycle. He couldn’t help it; he liked being pressed up against them, the wind in his long curly hair, the adventure in his veins. It was exciting in a way he never got to feel in Hawkins.

And they smelled good, like some sort of expensive but ambiguously masculine soap. The kind that didn’t have a scent name but rather marketed itself as “Freedom” or “Bourbon” but smelled nothing like alcohol.

For months, he’d wanted to ride on the back of their motorcycle, back when he was just an idiot waiter with a crush calling them ‘The Doctor.’ Now that he knew what it was like, he could confirm for past Mike that it was even better than he’d imagined. 

Lucas followed them home, “just to be safe,” which Mike would never admit but found kind of sweet. And then once they’d made it home, it was only polite to invite him in, and to offer him a beverage.

Politeness was on Mike’s side, for once. 

It was too late for coffee, Lucas didn’t drink tea, they were out of hot cocoa, and so that left apple cider. Mike heated up three mugs and added cinnamon sticks so it could be extra fancy. 

“You’re a collection of fall beverages, aren’t you?” Max teased, accepting their mug. They took a sip and moaned happily and Mike pretended very hard that it didn’t do things to him. 

He saw in Lucas’ eyes, though, that he wasn’t the only one that the sound affected. 

To disguise the fact his face was probably beet red, Mike took a long sip of his cider. “Fall is the best season,” he replied. “Fall drinks, fall weather. All of it.” Mike was a particular fan of cozy sweaters and warm beverages. Plus the colors.

“Fall mysteries,” Max quipped, taking another sip. “Fall revolution.”

Lucas snorted. “Melodramatic.”

“Yeah, what’s your point?” Max demanded, pulling the cinnamon stick out and poking Lucas’ nose with it. “You’re the one who followed us home, it’s not like you’re the image of calm and collected.”

Lucas raised an eyebrow. “This is home now?”

Max glanced warily over at Mike. He shrugged and nodded. Last night, there had been nowhere else to take Max. Tonight, he hadn’t even thought about them going anywhere else.

“Thanks for giving me a place to stay.” Max nudged his foot with theirs. 

“Of course,” he replied, because there was never any way that he wouldn’t. 

Max looked down, slightly embarrassed. “I do need some clean clothes though,” they added quietly. “I’ve been wearing these for like two days now and I can smell the stress-sweat.”

“Your step-dad works weekdays, right?” Lucas asked, and Max nodded. “We’ll go back tomorrow, during his work hours, and we’ll grab everything you want to take with you. You can take some of your mom’s stuff, too. Sound good, Mike?”

Of course Mike was in, especially after what’d gone down with Neil Hargrove the last time. He nodded and gave a grin that he was pretty sure Nancy would be proud of.

The three of them drank in comfortable silence for a little while. Mike wished he had cookies or something to offer too, but the cider would have to do on its own.

Will got home at some point, said a quick hello again to everyone, and then went to collapse into bed. 

“Kali must already have him working hard,” Lucas observed. 

“Are you upset that she can help Will but you couldn’t?” Sometimes, Mike’s mouth liked to run before he gave it permission, and now was one of those times. He wanted to hide his face.

Lucas shrugged delicately, though, and nursed his near-empty mug. “I always feel bad when I can’t help someone,” he replied. “I always want to help, to make people’s lives better, and if I can’t, it feels like I’m not living up to my purpose. But at the same time, I can recognize that Kali is far more of an expert than I will ever be, and that I shouldn’t take it as a personal failure.”

“Very wise, Gandalf,” Max teased, but with a genuine smile on their face.

Mike took a minute to ponder this. “You make my life better,” he settled on, and got that beautiful grin in response. 

“Thanks, man.” Lucas glanced at his watch. “I should head home for the night.”

“Drive safe,” Mike replied automatically, then winced because he definitely sounded like his mother in that moment. 

Lucas just looked at him fondly, though, and pulled him in for an unexpected hug. “Always.”

With another hug for Max, he was off, leaving the two of them to avoid looking at each other in awkward silence for a minute. 

“I’m beat,” Mike said finally. “Mind if I grab my pajamas from my room before you turn in?”

“Mike, you don’t have to sleep on the couch in your own home.” Max rolled their eyes and crossed their arms. “I don’t want to impose.”

“You’re a guest!” he insisted. “I can’t let _you_ sleep on the couch.” Mike took the rules of hospitality very seriously.

“It’s really not a big deal -”

“Absolutely not, Max!”

“Shut up, you’re gonna wake Will,” they hissed, swatting at his arm. “Fine! You have a double bed! We’ll just both sleep in it.”

His eyes widened. “Oh.”

They rolled their eyes at his expression. “Relax, Wheeler, I don’t bite without asking first.” 

At that, he was seized by the sudden, irrational desire to ask. Just to goad them, he told himself. To see how far they would go.

“Yeah, okay.” He swallowed thickly. “Cool.”

They were sleeping in his clothes and they looked more precious than he was willing to admit, standing in front of his bathroom sink with the sweatpants rolled up three times around the ankles. “Why are you so fucking tall?” they groused, toothbrush hanging loosely in their mouth as they shook their left ankle.

“Why are you so short?” he replied, then rested his elbow on top of their head for good measure. 

Max snorted. “Asshole. Not all of us are born with that much testosterone, you know.”

“Do you want it?” he asked suddenly, not bothering to think before the words left his mouth.

“What?”

“Testosterone,” he clarified. “I mean - I know a little bit about being transgender, but not really about the parts where you’re not a woman or a man. Like, what do you want? What does it mean for you?”

If Max’s eyes got any wider, Mike was pretty sure he could’ve fallen into them. 

“Well,” they began slowly. “You’re a dude.” He nodded. “And I’m not.” He nodded again. “And Nancy’s a girl, but I’m not.” Another nod. “I just want to go through life without people calling me a girl the same way you do, but without calling me a guy like she does. I just want to be...me.” 

Mike nodded again. “Okay. I can understand that, I think.”

“You don’t think it’s weird?” Max asked skeptically.

“I mean, not any weirder than the rest of it.” Mike shrugged. “Dustin can do a whole lecture on how sexual dimorphism is fake, actually, and human sex is actually a set of characteristics that sometimes get mixed up in ways you wouldn’t expect. I’ve heard it twice,” he added, which prompted a beautiful smile from Max. “I’m sure he’d be willing to give it to you.”

Max snorted. “No thanks, I think I’ve got that part covered.”

Of course they did, Mike scolded himself. “So if you’re neither, how - what do you do to transition?” he asked. “Because if you were trying to go from one to the other, there’s an obvious end goal, but you...don’t really have that. There’s not really any way to make sure people aren’t wrong, at least some of the time.”

Max snickered. “So you know when people look at you, they go, ‘oh that’s a guy?’ I want people to look at me and think ‘What the fuck.’”

Mike couldn’t help it, he started cracking up, and his path back to the bed turned into a quick fall onto the mattress. They clearly meant for it to be funny, though, and didn’t take any offense - in fact, they looked happier and happier every second he spent laughing. 

He wasn’t sure he’d ever seen them smile like this back in high school. It was breath-taking.

“So to circle back to your earlier question,” Max started when he’d finally stopped laughing enough to have some quiet, “I don’t actually know if I want to do any sort of hormone therapy, and I think I prefer -” Their face got bright red and they cut off abruptly.

“You prefer?” Mike prompted, because he wanted them to know he was supportive and that they could talk about anything with him.

They stared into the carpet on his bedroom floor. “I prefer the genitals I’ve got, because a strap-on gives you options,” they mumbled.

Mike felt his own face heat up. “Oh.” Now there was an image he wouldn’t be able to get out of his head. He could already feel his body starting to betray him as he laid back on the bed staring up at them, but he forced nonchalance. “Yeah, I guess having customizable parts would be pretty cool if you weren’t just one or the other.”

Though their face was still red, Max grinned. “It is. And I’ve already gotten top surgery. I saved like hell for that.”

Mike scrunched up his nose. “What?”

Max had changed in the bathroom, but they clearly lost all sense of modesty as they shucked off his t-shirt and tossed it beside the bed. Mike squeaked, closed his eyes, then opened them, then closed them again.

“The entire point is for you to look, dude,” Max teased, so he sat up and forced his eyes open and thought cold-shower thoughts, staring at their chest. 

There were two large scars across their chest, dark and smooth, and before he could stop himself, his thumb was skating across the healed tissue, just under their scar-connected nipples. He could feel the bumps of their ribs through the skin. 

They shivered, and he caught himself. “Fuck, I’m - I’m so sorry.” He pulled his hands back like he’d touched an iron and covered his face with them. “My bad.”

Max swallowed. “It’s cool.” He peeked up at them through his fingers. “Seriously, Wheeler. I’m just - surprised you don’t find them gross,” they added with false lightness. “I mean, they’re pretty gnarly.”

“I dunno, I think they’re cool,” Mike mumbled, and tried unsuccessfully not to think about kissing the scars.

“Huh.” Rather than answer, Max fell back onto the bed beside him. “I’m learning so much about the things you’re into these days.”

His face got hot and he started to sputter out a denial as they laughed at him. 

“Relax, dumbass, I’m just teasing.” They rolled their eyes at him again. “I know how you feel about me.”

If that was the case, he was hoping they’d clue him in, because right now, staring at the dusting of freckles across their nose and their pale moon-lit skin and the shiny scars on their chest, he wasn’t sure what he was feeling. 

“I can’t believe I never realized you hated me because you were in love with Lucas,” they snorted, and then he was protesting all over again. “Oh my god, Mike, shut up, you’re so obvious, I was just...convinced you were straight.” 

They said the last part almost sadly. Mike wondered if he could have been there for them in high school, if this was a thing they talked about. 

“I never hated you,” he whispered, rolling onto his side to face them. “You just...annoyed me.”

“Still do,” Max replied, grinning cheekily. “It’s my hobby.”

“ _God_.” Now it was Mike’s turn to roll his eyes. 

“But I know you didn’t,” they continued. “I remember when James dared Troy to kiss me at that party and you decked him before he even got within arm’s reach.”

“He broke my nose.” Mike remembered two things about that day: white hot rage at the look of horrified disgust on Max’s face, and the warm blood dripping down his chin.

“Then I broke his arm, even though I was wasted. But you always looked out for me at parties.” Max smiled fondly. “You’re good at getting your ass kicked to defend me.”

Mike frowned. “At least I try,” he sulked. “Besides, what about that time Dustin was being a pain in the ass and I talked to him about feminist theory and how he should take no for an answer?”

“Yeah, that was hot,” Max laughed, and Mike blushed. “But you mostly got your ass kicked. Still do, apparently.”

“What else was I supposed to do?” he demanded, crossing his arms over his chest. “I wasn’t going to let Neil hurt you.”

“So you let him hurt you?”

“If I have to! It’s always - it’s always better if it’s me than you.”

“Why?” Max demanded, and that was the million dollar question wasn’t it? His heart beat double time in his chest. 

“Because you’re you,” he settled on finally, and then they were leaning in carefully, nose to nose, their breath on his lips. 

Oh. He wanted to kiss them.

“You’re just as important,” they whispered. “If Neil hurt you - I mean, fuck, he did hurt you.” They took a shuddering breath. “Mike, I don’t know how to forgive myself.”

“Don’t do that.” He shook his head, and their noses brushed. “I’m a big kid. I made my choice.”

He knew they were the one who leaned in to close the gap, because he knew he’d never in a million years be brave enough. Their lips were soft, gentle, and their hand tangled in his hair and elicited a squeak out of him.

“You’re so fucking stupid,” they breathed, and then they kissed him again.

Somehow, his hands found their scars and he traced them as they ran their tongue over his lower lip. Their earlier comment about the strap-on came back to him and heat flooded his body.

But he didn’t have the guts for that, and all they did was kiss him until he fell asleep with his head on their bare chest, and that was just as good.


	7. World's Shittiest Zoo Animals

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warnings for this chapter: more homophobia and transphobia and abuse from Neil Hargrove, shitty people getting eaten by demogorgons, discussions of child abandonment and medical nonsense, self-injury but in a stupid heroic way not self-hating,

Max had woken up with Mike’s head on their bare chest and a feeling of dread in their stomach.

_Shit_.

Mike slept like the dead, and he always had, so it wasn’t hard for them to pull themself out from under him without waking him up. He gave a small snuffle and then burrowed into the pillow, wrapping his arms around it to replace their torso. 

They didn’t regret last night, per se. But it seemed like a much more stupid decision in the daylight. There were a couple dark splotches against his pale skin, across his collarbones that he wouldn’t quite be able to hide, and they were convinced _he’d_ regret it. 

God, they were stupid. One guy is cute and sweet and not straight and all of a sudden they’re falling all over him?

They pointedly did not acknowledge that this had been a long time coming. Just because they realized now that all their fighting in high school had been unresolved sexual tension for Max, didn’t mean Mike felt the same way. Besides, he’d basically admitted to being in love with Lucas, and they drew the line at being his consolation prize.

Well. They probably should’ve drawn the line earlier, but far too late now. 

They went to make pancakes in Mike’s kitchen and they didn’t even realize they’d forgotten to put their shirt on until Will walked in. His eyebrows climbed all the way up. 

“Are you okay?” he asked, appraising their bare torso.

At first they thought he meant their scars, but then Max glanced down and noticed some bright red scratch marks that Mike had apparently left with his stupid long nails (by accident, because the boy didn’t have a dominant bone in his body). They flushed. 

“Yep. Wonderful.” They offered him a plate of the pancakes they’d already finished. “Breakfast?”

Will looked entirely unconvinced and entirely too nosy, but he kept his mouth shut and accepted the pancakes gracefully. 

“I’m glad you’re back,” he said softly, sitting at their tiny kitchen table. “We missed you.”

Max flushed deeper and shrugged. “Missed you too.” 

“I’m heading over to my mom’s place this morning. Kali’s gonna teach me some stuff.” Will was already washing his plate; the boy had always eaten like a starving wolf. “Tell Mike where I am, please?”

Max almost snapped something defensive before they realized that this was _his_ house. Will was not suggesting anything untoward.

They weren’t even sure if Will was capable of suggesting something untoward, actually. 

They nodded and bopped his hand with the warm spatula. “Good luck.”

Will smiled and then he was gone, leaving Max alone in the kitchen with their own thoughts. Today’s offerings consisted of the fact they’d covered Mike in hickeys yesterday night and definitely had feelings for him, or maybe the fact they were still in love with Lucas after all this time, or the way they needed to go back to their house and grab their stuff, or Neil, or the whole interdimensional government conspiracy theory thing. 

Someone knocked on the door, so Max hurried to open it. It was Lucas, and they’d expected him, and yet still their heart managed to skip when they saw him.

“Morning.” He smiled softly at them. “Where’s Mike?”

“Sleeping,” Max replied, and then for a second time remembered they were _still_ not wearing a shirt. They went back to blushing. “I can go get him -” And grab some proper clothes, they added to themself, but Lucas waved his hand. 

“Nah, let him sleep.” He sniffed. “Something smells...good, but like it’s not going to be good very soon.”

Max swore. Why had they left a pancake on the stove?

Because they were a lovesick idiot, that’s why. 

The pancake wound up only somewhat singed on that side, and Max set it away from the rest for themself. Before they could protest, Lucas was grabbing it and a second pancake and making himself a breakfast plate.

“You don’t have to eat that,” Max insisted. “There’s better ones.”

“I know.” Lucas shrugged, then pulled a bottle of syrup out of Mike’s fridge and started drowning his pancake. “You’ve never made anything terrible before, though.”

Max snorted. “That’s a lie.”

“Okay, well, you’ve never made anything I haven’t liked,” he amended, as if they’d done all that much cooking for him.

“Now that just sounds like a challenge,” Max teased, raising an eyebrow. 

Lucas rolled his eyes and took a bite of the half-burnt pancake. “See? Delicious,” he answered through a mouthful of carbohydrates and syrup, grinning. 

Max couldn’t help but laugh. “ _Gross_.”

This was what it had been like. Constant bickering and teasing and an undercurrent of the emotional vulnerability that even if they couldn’t say it out loud, Max loved him. In a way, that had never really changed; they’d just stopped kissing.

Max missed the kissing.

“Max, where’d you go?” Mike called groggily, stumbling over to the kitchen. “Bed’s cold,” he whined. 

His shirt had apparently also never made it back on, just a pair of sweatpants hanging low on his bony hips. This wasn’t necessarily a problem, except for the part where his neck and collarbones were _covered_ in high-school amounts of hickeys that Max hadn’t noticed in the dark, and Lucas was definitely staring straight at them with raised eyebrows. 

Max buried their face in their hands. “Wheeler,” they groaned. “Open your fucking eyes.”

Only then did Mike seem to notice Lucas, and without a shirt on, they got to see that all of him blushed a very pretty red. 

“Hi!” he squeaked out. 

“Morning,” Lucas replied, not saying a word about what he was seeing. “Pancakes?”

Mike nodded vigorously. “Um. But. I’ll be back.” He sprinted off. 

“Bring me my shirt, Michael!” Max shouted after him, because they didn’t trust themself not to burn the pancakes again.

They managed a minute and a half before Lucas said, incredulously, “You and Mike?”

Max groaned again. “Can it.”

“I’m just saying -”

“It’s not like that, Lucas, I swear to god.”

His eyebrows climbed even higher. “One, lying to a psych major is bad form, lying to your friend is worse. Two, he’s fucking covered, what other way is there for it to be?”

Max was bad at emotions, and right now, they couldn’t tell _what_ Lucas was feeling. He sounded amused, but also - kind of mad, but that made no sense, or sad maybe, or -

Oh, shit, he was _really_ still into them, and they’d just hooked up with his best friend.

They let their head fall back against the cabinets with a groan. “Look, it was a -”

“If you say ‘mistake’ I’m going to break this fucking plate,” Lucas groused. “I’ve known you and Mike had something since freshman year, I just didn’t realize _you_ would ever realize. Or, hell, do something about it.”

Max spluttered out a protest. “I was dating you! And I did - that was real.”

“You can love more than one person, Max.” He smiled at them, then, a real smile full of love and warmth because he was a good man. “I’m not mad or anything. I never was. I just...I’m surprised, is all. I’m happy for you.”

“It didn’t mean anything,” Max said with finality, because it didn’t, it was just one bad decision that they refused to allow to haunt them. 

Lucas jutted his chin towards the hallway. “I don’t think he feels the same way.”

Max managed to sputter a beleaguered “He’s in love with _you_!” before Mike walked into the kitchen.

He didn’t appear to have heard any of the conversation, just held out a red henley towards Max expectantly. “Here.”

“This isn’t mine,” they remarked as they took it from his hands.

“Well, yeah. You’ve been wearing the same t-shirt for two days, I thought you’d want to change. Also it’s supposed to be pretty cold today, you should dress warmly.” He looked down at his feet the whole time he was saying it, face in flames. 

Max shrugged the shirt on and muttered a “thanks” as it was halfway over their head. It was warm and soft and it smelled like Mike and they liked it a lot more than they wanted to.

Lucas looked between the two of them, fond and a little sad. Max’s heart twisted, but they’d told him. They’d told him all those years ago, they couldn’t be his girlfriend, and he needed to let go. They didn’t date guys that only liked girls.

Even if they wanted him so badly. 

“Shall we?” he offered, gesturing towards the door. “Time to rescue your stuff.”

Max nodded, swallowing. “Yeah, may as well.”

Mike shoved a pancake in his mouth and threw them a thumbs up. “I’m ready.”

Max rolled their eyes, laughing. “You’re both disgusting.”

“Yeah, but that’s why you love us,” Lucas replied with a crooked grin.

The sentence made their chest feel warm and tight and he probably didn’t mean it that way, but they did, they loved both boys. 

They made Mike take shotgun and they kicked his seat again but he wouldn’t look them in the eye, just kind of grumbled, and oh fuck, they’d really, really messed everything up. Stupid - fucking - hormones, and an intense need to be desired, and, and -

“Max, your face is gonna get stuck like that.” They looked up and made eye contact in the rearview mirror with one very concerned Lucas. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” they lied, and he left it, because he always knew when they lied but he never pressed them, with the exception of this morning. 

They’d asked about it, one time, because everyone else just wanted to know immediately, would pressure and cajole. He’d shrugged and answered, “I trust you. I know you have some reason for not telling me, and I’m sure you’ll tell me when you’re ready.”

“What if I’m never ready?”

“Then that’s okay, too.”

They went back to silently staring out the window as Hawkins rolled by, pulling their denim jacket just a little tighter around themself. Mike was right, it was cold outside, and dead leaves littered the sidewalks and yards and the streets. It seemed fitting, somehow, and the tree in Max’s front yard looked the most dead of them all.

The house itself looked dead. “Wait outside,” they directed. “If you see Neil come back for whatever reason, warn me so I can get out.”

The boys nodded, and Max wondered if Mike was going to get the same “So. You and Max?” interrogation that they had, but they decided that was very much not their problem right now. One struggle at a time, they reminded themself, jamming the key into the lock and wincing at the too-loud clicks, even though there wasn’t anyone around to hear them. 

The house was a mess. Clearly, Neil had suffered from having no humans to take his rage out on, and for the first time in a while, Max felt a surge of bitterness at Billy for just taking off and leaving them behind with this monster, but it’s not like they’d ever had a good relationship anyway. Why shouldn’t he have looked out for himself first?

It’s what they would’ve done, Max decided, even if it didn’t ring quite true.

They dodged a few piles of broken glass and ducked into their room. They wanted to be in and out as fast as possible, and yet somehow, as they found themself surrounded by all the bits and pieces of the last nine years of their life, they felt paralyzed, pinned down by their past like a butterfly on a corkboard.

There weren’t photos on the walls, but Max dug out the shoebox under the bed and started shuffling through. So many of them with Lucas and Mike; Max and Dustin at a track meet, red-faced and grinning; a photo of the time Ms. Byers had taken Will and Max to Chicago for the weekend and it “just so happened” to coincide with the Pride parade. 

Joyce had known before Max did. Joyce was clever like that, though Max supposed it made sense considering she was bisexual with two queer sons and now a not-wife. While Max didn’t get mothering at home in high school, there was a special something from being in the Byers house. It eased the aching in their heart just a little.

They hadn’t realized they were crying until a teardrop landed on top of Will’s face. They scrubbed at their eyes; they had a job to do. Pack now, mourn the childhood they never got later. 

All told, the clothes they didn’t hate fit into a single suitcase. Some jeans and shirts, socks and underwear. One dress with a fancy collar that buttoned all the way and had a skirt that flared out when they spun. A shitty friendship bracelet Dustin had made. A pair of sneakers Will had painted to look like a watermelon. 

The pendant Lucas and Mike had bought them for Christmas sophomore year of high school, because it was too expensive for Lucas to afford on his own but he’d been dead set on it. 

It was wasting precious moments, but they took a second to put the pendant on and tuck the jade into their shirt. It came to rest over their heart. 

The photos meant everything. Max wanted their skateboard, obviously. But as they looked around the room, there wasn’t really anything else worth keeping. So much of it was stupid, useless stuff from their mother and Neil, trying to get them to be feminine in a way they just weren’t suited to. 

Max didn’t feel any regret as they shut the door to their bedroom behind them. 

“Maxine?”

They did, however, feel ice in their veins at that. They turned towards the living room. “Neil.” He was sprawled out on the couch and halfway through a bottle of whiskey even though it was barely ten a.m., sitting under a lamp with the shades all drawn. “Don’t you have work?”

“You and your mother _ran off_ ,” he spat, levering himself up to sit. “I wanted to be here when you came back.”

They raised an eyebrow. “To apologize?”

He spluttered. “Hell no,” he replied. “To hear you grovel.”

Max made a faux-sympathetic noise through their teeth. “Mm, sorry, not going to happen. Bye, Neil.” They turned back towards the front door, but he was surprisingly agile for a drunk man, and he was upon them in two strides, dragging them back towards the living room and then throwing them against the bookshelf for good measure. 

It fucking hurt. Max could feel a cut on their forehead beginning to drip blood down their face, and their palms were raw where they caught themself on the wood. 

“You know,” Neil began, crowding their space, and they could smell the whiskey on his breath. “I never laid a hand on you. Your mother begged me not to. Now I see I should have trusted my instincts. Spare the rod, spoil the child.”

He was taller than them, with a hand on either shoulder, but Max was _pissed_.

“It didn’t work for your son,” they hissed.

Neil growled in the back of his throat. “That boy was always beyond help. Saw it in his eyes when he was born. You can’t beat the devil out of a kid, even if you try.”

“Can you beat it out of a man?” Max asked, and while Neil was distracted for a split second trying to figure out what the hell they meant, they drove their skull forward and upward into his nose.

It gave a sickening crunch. They felt his hot blood on their forehead for just a second before he staggered back. 

“ _Bitch_!” he shouted.

“Uh, yeah!” Max shouted back, because what the fuck else did he expect? 

Any other retort they were trying to think up was cut-off by the lights going out for a second, and then when they flipped back on, there was a fucking _monster_ in the middle of their living room floor. 

Max couldn’t help it. They screamed. 

“What the _hell_ is that?” Neil demanded, scrambling backwards, but it wasn’t as though Max had any succinct explanation. They hurried to the fireplace and grabbed a poker, then turned around just in time to see the thing descend on Neil with its open mouth and millions of teeth.

The lights went off again, and when they came back, Neil was gone. 

Max wasn’t sure if they should thank the monster, but it made that decision for them as it swung around and started lumbering towards them.

“ _Shit_!”

In the ruckus, Max must have missed the sound of the door, because Lucas and Mike tripped into the living room. 

“Hey, asshole!” Lucas shouted, demanding its attention. “Pick on someone your own size!”

It was a ridiculous sentence. Lucas was not anywhere near the size of the demogorgon, and besides, Max had it _handled_ , but they had to admit that when it swung around to look at Lucas, it presented them an excellent opportunity to bash its skull with the poker, even if it promptly flew out of their hands. 

Or at least, where the skull should’ve been. The head just kind of compressed, like a rubber dog toy, and then puffed up again where the poker was no longer located. The monster screamed and wheeled back around on Max.

That was unfortunate. Max pressed themself into the wall, swearing internally. This was a shit way to go. They weren’t sure how to process the fact that one of the last things they’d done was make out with Mike and make Lucas sad.

Well, fuck, if they were gonna die, he at least deserved to know they were still in love with him. 

“Lucas, I -” they began, annoying amounts of panic in their voice. Even when they were about to die, they hated showing emotion. 

“I got you!” he shouted back, and then the monster was flying across the room where Lucas had swung the poker like a bat into its neck. “Mike!”

“On it!” Mike was on them in seconds, pulling them back towards the door, but they resisted. 

“We can’t just leave him there!” they insisted. “He’s a terrible fighter.”

“He’s a black belt!” Mike exclaimed incredulously. 

“Yeah but like...emotionally.” They didn’t know how to explain it, exactly, just that he was sweet and gentle and his heart wasn’t made for fighting. 

“He can do it for you,” Mike said softly, but they slipped out of his grasp and ran into Neil and Susan’s room, dropping to their knees to dig through the absolute mess. 

“C’mon, c’mon,” they mumbled, but Susan’s hairspray was nowhere to be found. “Fuck it, this is flammable, right?” They snatched up a bottle of perfume. It would have to do. 

Of course, puffing a small bottle of perfume through a lighter made a pretty sad flamethrower, which should’ve been obvious, and the monster seemed more inconvenienced than hurt. But Max _did_ manage to set the rug and the curtains on fire, which was kind of impressive, all things considered.

“Shit.”

* * *

Will had a lot of emotions. Always. That was one of the things that made him so good at art, according to his mother, that he had feelings he could turn into colors and put onto paper. 

According to Lonnie Byers - because let’s face it, the man hadn’t been Will’s father in years - it was one of the things that made him contemptible and weak. That proved he’d never amount to anything more powerful than a kid with some crayons. 

Kali shrugged. “I mean I’m sure somebody somewhere like us has figured out how to use their power without emotion, but I sure as hell haven’t.”

According to Kali Prasad, though, those emotions were what made him an all-powerful force to be reckoned with.

Dottie and Dustin were sprawled out in the backyard, watching. Karen had instituted a very strong “no psychic powers in the house” rule, so even though it was kind of chilly, they were outside, just in case.

Dustin didn’t seem to mind having his butt on the cold grass, and he’d let Dottie snuggle in close to him to steal some of his warmth. It was cute, Will thought, the way Dustin could make friends so quickly and easily. 

It helped that Dottie was also a mega science nerd. 

“As best I’ve figured out, these powers are like...some kinda evolutionary defense mechanism,” she explained. It had become quickly apparent that Kali _used_ the powers, but Dottie _understood_ them. Kali didn’t seem to care much for the science behind it, so the two of them were teamed up to teach Will.

Mick was their strategist, being the most level-headed and logical of the bunch, but she’d made a “curriculum” for Will and then disappeared with Funshine because she was desperate for a burger (and probably some peace and quiet).

Dustin was officially in charge of the list. “Guuuuuuys,” he drawled. “You’re not following _the plan_.”

“Oh, fuck Mick’s plan,” Dottie said without any heat. 

“Fuck Mick,” Kali replied with a smirk. 

Dottie threw a ballpoint pen at her head, which she caught easily. “We are surrounded by _children!_ ” Dottie insisted. “Keep it appropriate!”

Dustin gave a disgruntled squawk. “I’m twenty-two!”

“A baby,” Dottie replied solemnly. “You’re the same age as my baby brother, and he was a toddler when my Mama sent me away for high school. Thereby, you are a toddler.”

“That’s not how logic works,” Dustin protested, though he stiffened at the reminder of Dottie’s quote-unquote ‘tragic backstory,’ as she referred to it with a grin.

“Sure it is.” Dottie smiled crookedly. “It’s called a syllogism.”

“Your mother didn’t send you away for high school,” Kali drawled. Will knew what she was about to say - not with his foresight or anything, just because he’d heard this conversation twice already. “She sent you to a shitty prison of a mental hospital where they abused you. You taught yourself everything you know.”

Dottie flipped her hair over her shoulder. “Yeah, well, these boys got Hawkins High, I got Sister Beatrice’s School of Hard Knocks.” She grinned. Will and Dustin winced. Kali frowned.

Will was kind of baffled by the way Dottie seemed completely unbothered by all the terrible shit she’d been through, but he could tell he wasn’t as baffled as Kali. Kali burned white-hot with rage at her past, and she just couldn’t wrap her head around feeling any different. 

“Besides, you busted me out and I’m happy now,” Dottie added, poking Kali’s ankle with the toe of her boot. “I got a real family. And! I found another baby brother!” She reached up and rustled Dustin’s hair, earning another squawk, but impossibly fond.

When Dustin was fourteen years old, he’d told his parents that he liked boys and girls; his mother had taken it well, but by the end of the week, she’d kicked her asshole now-ex-husband to the curb and told him not to come back. It had just been Dustin and Claudia in that house for years, and it was obvious Dustin was lonely.

One night, when Will and Dustin got drunk in high school (because the thing Mr. Henderson left behind that wasn’t his wonderful son was a cabinet of spirits), Dustin confessed he’d always felt responsible for his parents’ divorce, he’d forced his mother to choose between Dustin and the man she’d married. But Will had seen the same look in Claudia Henderson’s eyes as his own mother when she’d divorced Lonnie: it had never been a choice in the first place. It was always going to be Dustin.

So to see all this casual love and camaraderie made Will smile. Dustin deserved to have family.

“Okay, okay, okay, but for real!” Dustin wrestled his head out of Dottie’s hands and held up the scrap of notebook paper. “Step one: The Multi-Dimensional Shit.”

Kali raised an eyebrow. “That’s not what Mick wrote.”

“I’m paraphrasing.”

Kali shrugged. “Okay, so there’s Here, and there’s There, yeah?” Will nodded. “And then there’s a space between Here and There, which I have for obvious reasons called ‘The In-Between.’”

“I don’t really know much beyond what Kali can tell me, since I’ve never seen it myself,” Dottie continued. “But as best I can tell, over There is a parallel dimension to ours, but with a fundamental difference. The whole place is muted and cloudy and overgrown, according to Kali, and filled with these upright monster things - we call them ‘Walkers.’”

“We call them ‘Demogorgons,’” Dustin replied. 

Dottie’s eyes lit up. “Like the D&D monster! Kal, I like that better, can we use that instead?”

Kali rolled her eyes. “I am going to continue calling things what I’ve always called them. You do what you want.”

“Neat! Anyway, we know it’s different, but we don’t know _why_ ,” Dottie concluded. 

“Uh. There’s a giant cloud monster in the sky that all the Shades call ‘It.’ I think that’s the parasite that made the world different,” Will suggested. “Drained the life out of it.”

Kali shrugged. “Not like I’ve ever been there, can’t tell you one way or another.”

“So how do you know all the details about it?” Will asked.

“The In-Between.”

“Which is what?” Will asked. 

Kali narrowed her eyes and chewed on her lip thoughtfully, before settling on something with a shrug. “It’s like a zoo,” she began with the ease of a well-practiced metaphor. “There and Here are exhibits, behind glass, and the In-Between is the space you stand when you watch instead of being in the exhibit yourself.”

Eleven - Jane - slipped out the back door and sat down next to Dottie, pulling her knees up to her chest and crossing her arms over them. “Watch,” she echoed softly.

Dottie nodded and picked up the thread. “So my theory is that there’s some number of dimensions greater than one - we know of two, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t others. And the In-Between is what connects them all. Certain individuals have the ability to shift their consciousness into this In-Between space and observe, like Kali and Jane and now you.”

“But I’ve never been In-Between,” Will pointed out. “Just here and The Upside Down.”

Dottie pouted. “Kal, why are their names for these things so much cooler?”

“Focus,” Kali replied dryly. 

“Right. Well, the theory is that you _can_ with the proper training. Typically, the people who can do this have a different relationship with Here - no, that doesn’t make sense, hold on.” Dottie scrunched up her nose and shook her head, ordering her thoughts the same way Dustin did. “You can interact with things in this plane differently than most. From a logical standpoint, like I said, the powers seem like an evolutionary defense. But all we have right now is correlation. One might cause the other, or they could be caused by the same mystery third factor.”

“Okay, so that’s...Dimensions and Powers explained.” Dustin crossed them off Mick’s list. “You’re still going out of order, though.”

“It helps to have all the theory down before you try anything physically,” Dottie defended, though Kali gave a snort that suggested her disagreement. 

“I appreciate it,” Will said, earning a megawatt smile from Dottie. “So are these powers...do any two people have the same? Can we learn other skills?”

“Dunno.” Kali shrugged. “Besides Jane, you’re the first person like us I’ve met outside the lab. Brenner -” she spat the name like a curse “-tried to get us to trade, but he had a bad habit of viewing us as both sub- and super-human, so he worked the others to death before they could properly try.” 

“Terry and Jane have the same powers, which suggests there’s a hereditary component,” Dottie added, spreading her hands. “But your brother has different skills than you - both with a Knowledge bent, yours of events and his of emotions, but still different. Kali’s power is Illusory, and Terry and Jane had powers of Matter Manipulation.”

Kali clapped her hands. “Okay, enough. We’re wasting time.”

“Knowledge is not a waste,” Dottie grumbled, but she leaned back on her palms.

“Close your eyes,” she demanded impatiently. Will complied. “Forget the senses you’re used to, focus on the one that tells you where your body is in space.”

“It’s called Proprioception,” Dustin supplied helpfully.

“Cool. Not relevant.” Will couldn’t see anything but he was pretty sure that Kali was glaring at Dustin. “Do you have your position?”

“Uh...yes?” He thought he did. Jesus, he was an art teacher, the five senses were more than enough for him. 

“Cool. Now move it.”

“What?” He almost opened his eyes, but he didn’t. “What the hell does that mean?”

“So with your eyes, you see, and then you look somewhere else. Same thing. Take this sense and shift your perspective.”

Will didn’t know quite what the hell that meant, but he did his best, moving his body just a smidgen.

Kali huffed impatiently. “You’re still perceiving the same thing.”

“Yes?”

“This is easier with sensory deprivation, but you need to be able to hear my instructions. For now, tune out everything in the world as best you can, ignore this plane, and shift your perspective.”

Tuning everything out seemed more than impossible right now.

Kali must’ve anticipated his thought, because she sighed. “Look, if you can’t do it, I’ll have Funshine hypnotize you when he gets back so the only thing you can perceive is my voice, okay? But if you can do it in a less-than-ideal environment, you can do it anywhere.”

“Your friend knows hypnosis?” Dustin asked, and Will didn’t need to look to imagine the wonder on his face. “That’s so cool! Is he psychic too?”

“No, he’s just good with words and brains,” Dottie replied, and then Kali hissed at both of them and they shut up. 

Okay. Shift his perspective. He could do that. When he looked somewhere else, he moved his line of sight. So if he wanted to get to another plane…

It felt like spinning too fast and falling, but accompanied by the feeling of _rightness_ that came with doing it as a kid. Will opened his eyes and was met with endless blackness all around, and a shallow layer of water under his feet that didn’t actually seem to be getting him wet.

Kali appeared in front of him. “Good work,” she praised, a smile curving up her lips. “Welcome to the In-Between.”

“Huh.” Will looked around. It wasn’t much. “What do you do here?”

“It’s like the zoo, right?” Kali gestured for him to follow so he did, hearing their quiet wet footfalls and feeling none of the water. “So let’s look at some animals.”

The first thing they observed was The Upside Down. Will was pretty sure that had more to do with him, because Kali seemed to be letting him drive. 

“It’s just turning your head to look at what you want to see,” she said. “Your consciousness does all the rest.”

“Have you ever been there?” he asked, gesturing at The Upside Down.

Kali shook her head. “I only know three people who have. You, Jane, and her mom. And your friend Mike for a minute to get you out.”

“Dustin also went.”

Kali stared at him incredulously. “Your boyfriend is an idiot.”

“He’s not my -” Will started to protest, but she did have a point. “Yeah, he’s an idiot. When did Jane’s mom go?”

“Jane’s mom is the one who originally tore open the hole Mike was able to rescue you through,” Kali replied. “Brenner wanted to make tunnels. It’s...not as easy as he expected. I assume he attempted to have Eleven open it more and stabilize it, but now the veil separating the two planes is thin enough that things can just cross over anywhere. So be on the lookout for Walkers,” she added. “They’re not usually here but it’s like there’s a hole in the fence, so they might be able to get in.”

Next, they looked at the backyard where Kali and Will stood facing each other, eyes closed. Dottie and Dustin looked bewildered and intrigued, but Jane was amusing herself by making a tennis ball float. Will had to admit it wasn’t riveting.

“I want to look for Max,” Will suggested. They hadn’t looked all that happy this morning. Kali nodded, so he moved his head and saw Max in the living room with Neil and he sucked in a breath. Then, he saw Max headbutt Neil and break his nose.

He couldn’t help but cheer as Neil staggered back, blood pouring down his face. But elation turned to horror as a Demogorgon snapped into view and promptly devoured Neil Hargrove. 

“Shit. Shit, shit, shit, they need help,” he insisted, even as Mike and Lucas ran in to assist. “I need - we need to kill it.”

But how could he get it to come to them? He tried to think of the last few times he’d seen it - outside his house with Jane, when Holly fell out of the tree, the fight with Neil - 

“It’s blood,” he gasped. “They’re drawn by blood.”

Before he could think better of it, he opened his mouth and screamed, louder than he knew he could. Kali clapped her hands over her ears and then vanished, and Will was close behind. He stayed just long enough to feel the monster look straight at him. 

Continuing his trend of not thinking through stupid plans, Will whipped the swiss army knife (a birthday gift from Dustin) out of his pocket and slashed his palm open. 

Dustin screamed. “Will, what the fuck are you doing?” 

The Demogorgon appeared before Will had a chance to answer. He figured that was enough explanation for now. He also figured it’d be _really_ handy if he could access some powers more like Jane’s right now.

“Fucking - _Christ!_ ” Kali shouted, then threw out her hand. A wall of thorns sprung up between the monster and Will, and brambles started to grow around it. It was pretty effective, right up until the monster struggled and realized there wasn’t anything holding it, and proceeded forwards towards Will with intensity.

“ _No!_ ” Jane thrust a hand out and _twisted_ , and the Demogorgon’s neck bent and snapped. Or - it wasn’t so much a snapping as it was a sticky ripping noise as the head sort of lolled and fell loose. The rest of its body fell to the ground soon after.

“Christ, Will, are you insane?” Dustin demanded, rushing over to him.

Will felt oddly flattered that he was Dustin’s priority over checking the corpse of the monster. “It’s attracted by blood,” he explained. Blood that continued to flow out of the wound. “I saw it attacking Max and Mike and Lucas, I needed to get it away from them.” 

“So you _slashed_ your palm and brought it here?” Dustin fussed. “Wouldn’t a more measured cut have worked just as well?”

“There wasn’t a whole lot of _time_ , Dustin,” Will replied, but he couldn’t be annoyed at Dustin caring about him.

Will glanced up as Kali shouted flatly, “Catch.” It was Dustin that caught the hurtling white cylinder though. Bandages. 

Of course she just carried a roll of bandages on her. Seemed about right.

“I need to disinfect it,” Dustin declared. 

Dottie did _not_ throw her contribution, but instead handed a small silver flash to Dustin. “It’s bourbon,” she explained before he could ask. “And yes, you can use it to clean a wound. It’ll hurt like a motherfucker, but you can do it.”

Dustin looked at Will for permission. He nodded, and he quickly realized Dottie was right. It did hurt like a motherfucker. He hissed.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Dustin chanted quietly. “I know this sucks.” He took a bit of bandage and carefully wiped away the pool of blood, then started wrapping Will’s palm as quickly as possible to try and stem the flow. The bottom layer was already bright red, but Dustin kept wrapping until Will’s hand was nice and secure.

“One more thing.” He pulled Will’s palm up and kissed it. “There. All better,” he said with a crooked grin.

Will wondered, not for the first time, why he hadn’t just kissed Dustin yet. Before he could decide to remedy that situation, he was being knocked to the ground by something small, heavy, and slimy. The mouth full of teeth unfurled in his face.

“D’Art!” Dustin shouted. “No! Bad boy! Back!”

Suddenly, it was being yanked away, and Will saw Kali with her hand squeezed around the thing’s throat. Emotionlessly, she twisted it sharply, and the head detached from this one, too.

“You killed my science!” Dustin complained. 

“Your science almost killed your boyfriend,” Kali replied. “I did you a favor.”

Dustin did not dispute the ‘boyfriend’ bit, which Will found oddly endearing, but now was _not_ the time.

“Jane, are you okay?” he asked, hurrying over to where the girl was sitting on the ground, nose bleeding.

She scowled at him. “Bad.” She pointed to his bandaged hand. “Don’t do that.”

“I’m sorry, Janey, I had to.” Will sat down in front of her. “You shouldn’t have had to kill that thing, so I’m sorry.”

“She’s the only one who can,” Kali answered, her face the picture of unbothered pragmatism. 

Will glanced up at her. “You just killed one.”

“That was an adolescent. Only Jane is strong enough to handle a full-grown creature. Typically we try to get away from them, not bring them to us,” she added sardonically, but a small smile seemed to be trying to escape.

Will hugged himself. “She shouldn’t have to kill anything, fight anything. She’s just a kid.”

“She has never been a child.” Kali shrugged. “It wasn’t an option for us.”

“That makes it _worse_!” Will insisted, wishing he could somehow go back in time and save Kali and Jane and Terry and the others Brenner had killed. Wishing he could give them all the life they deserved.

Kali shrugged again. “It is what it is.” She turned to Jane. “Since you and your mom made the portal, do you think you can close it?” Jane nodded resolutely. “Right. You know how you moved the fabric to rip it apart, so I need you to move it and put it back together. You,” she nodded at Dustin, “go call your friends.” 

“What about training Will?” Dustin asked.

Kali shook her head, jaw set. “This has gone on long enough. It’s time to end this.”

* * *

When Lucas was sixteen years old, he came to the very sudden realization he was bisexual after waking up from a very romantic and very intimate dream about Mike and Max. So it’s not like he’d never pictured them together before. It’s just that when he had, he’d been involved.

He may have slightly taken for granted the fact that Max and Mike orbited around him like planets, even after Max broke up with him. And even when he’d left for college, Max had followed him. Mike had stopped keeping in touch, but Max was still the constant in his life.

And now Max was biting messages into Mike’s collarbones and Lucas hadn’t even _considered_ the two of them might be able to figure out they were attracted to each other without him.

He was the emotionally aware one between the three of them. Which meant he was presently very aware of his emotions. Right now, he was worried about Max and Mike, sort of freaked out for himself considering the fact the living room was on fire, unreasonably jealous, and mad at himself for being distracted and jealous.

At least the Demogorgon was gone. 

“Where did it go?” Max demanded, looking around wildly.

“Don’t know, don’t care.” Lucas grabbed them with one hand and Mike with the other. “Out, out of the house that’s on fire.”

When they collapsed in a heap on the front lawn, Lucas realized they maybe could’ve tried a little harder to put out the fire. But nothing good had ever happened in that house, anyway; may as well let it burn.

“My stuff!” Max gasped, dragged themself out of the pile, and ran back into the house.

Mike and Lucas exchanged a look of horror. “I got it,” Lucas decided, and he was on his feet and sprinting before he could think too hard. 

All he’d ever wanted was to keep his people safe.

The fire was spreading quickly and smoke was filling the house. Lucas coughed, wiping furiously at his eyes. “Max!”

“Lucas, get out!” Max screamed back. He heard banging, tripping, and a string of curses.

“No!” He couldn’t. Through the haze, he saw a shadow near the ground. “Not without you!” He hurried closer, reaching out until he felt their wrist in his grasp. 

“Dumbass!” Max coughed as the two of them staggered outside again.

“Me? You’re the one who ran back for your clothes!” Lucas frowned, seething. He was pissed off, but he also knew he was pissed off because he was terrified, even seeing Max relatively unhurt in front of him, just scraped up and sooty. He hugged himself tighter.

Being emotionally aware was less fun that it sounded, sometimes. 

Max wouldn’t meet his eyes. “It was the pictures,” they whispered. “Not the clothes. I just couldn’t let the pictures burn.”

“Oh.” Unable to hold off any longer, he reached out and pulled Max into a crushing embrace. “Christ, you scared me.”

“Sorry.” They even sounded like they meant it as they leaned into his embrace. 

This. This was what he missed. He only wished he could do it when they weren’t in mortal danger. He dropped a kiss on their forehead.

“You want me to drive?” Mike asked. 

Lucas raised his eyebrows. “Absolutely not.” No fucking way was Mike getting behind the wheel of his car, regardless of how long he’d been in love with the guy. “Here, take your -” What did you even call a genderqueer person you dated? “Take Max, I’ll start the car.”

“I’m _fine_ ,” Max insisted, but they didn’t pull away when Mike tucked them into his chest, breathing shudderingly against their hair. 

Lucas’ heart twisted, a sadder version of the way it used to whenever those two managed to stop bickering in high school. 

Mike helped Max into the backseat in spite of their protests, and then they kicked his seat in revenge, and Lucas couldn’t help his smile. No matter what, he loved these two more than anything. 

“Back to your moms’ house?” he asked. 

Mike nodded. “Probably a good home base.”

“Should we get a neighbor to call the fire department?” Lucas looked at the house in the rearview mirror, deceptively placid for now.

Max frowned. “Let it burn.”

“That...doesn’t seem safe,” Mike pointed out, knitting his eyebrows. 

“We’ll call when we get back to your moms’ place.” It seemed a reasonable compromise.

“Fine.” Max crossed their arms, recalcitrant. “If I must.”

When they pulled into the driveway, Dustin looked ready for war. “What the hell happened?” he demanded. “We called, but no one answered. Will said - the demogorgon -”

“House is on fire, we weren’t gonna answer the phone,” Max said brusquely. “Now Lucas said I have to call the fire department, so excuse me.” They pushed past Dustin and entered the house. 

Dustin’s jaw dropped. “That clarifies nothing!” he complained. 

Lucas sighed heavily. “We went back to get Max’s stuff, Neil turned out to be there, they got in a fight, the demogorgon ate Neil and tried to eat us, Max attempted a perfume flamethrower and set the living room on fire, the demogorgon vanished, and we left.” He rattled off the details as fast as possible, feeling a headache building behind his eyes. He left out the part about Max running back into the house; he couldn’t make himself say it.

“What the fuck?” Dustin asked after a beat.

“I have _no idea_ , man.” Lucas wanted to sleep for a very long time, preferably curled up with Max in one arm and Mike in the other. He had half a mind to never let them out of his sight again. “Why were you trying to call?”

“Eleven - Jane,” Dustin corrected himself at Kali’s glare, “thinks she can close the portal. Since apparently her mom is the one who opened it in the first place.”

“You’re telling me that portal’s been open for over a decade?” Lucas demanded disbelievingly. Surely they would have noticed before now.

Kali shook her head. “It healed itself the first time. Brenner used Jane to rip it open again.”

“If it healed itself once, why can’t it just do that again?” Mike asked.

“How the fuck should I know?” Kali snorted. “It’s a parallel dimension, I’m not exactly an expert.”

“Papa.” Jane looked around, probably for something she didn’t have words for, but she didn’t seem to find it. “Buzz.”

“Buzz?” Lucas asked. “Like a bee?”

Jane shook her head. “Big buzz.” She waved her arms in a large arc, then sighed in frustration. “I want more words.”

Lucas’ heart twisted. “I promise I’ll teach you so many words as soon as I can.” This earned him a big smile from Jane and Mike both. “For now, let’s go shut down the portal, yeah?”

Mike deemed Kali’s van a “death trap on wheels.” Lucas couldn’t help but agree. “I can drive separately,” he suggested, but by the time they’d finished the deliberations, the whole party was in his car. 

It felt like high school again, with significantly less angst but approximately the same amount of bickering, mostly between Mike and Max. It might’ve been selfish of him, but Lucas couldn’t help the tiny flood of relief that even after they’d figured out whatever feelings they had, they still knew how to annoy each other. 

That meant they’d probably still want him around. 

The Waffle House was still shut down. Kali wrinkled her nose. “You work here?” she asked judgmentally. 

“Hey! Waffle House is an American treasure!” argued Dottie.

Mike ignored them both and shivered, stepping a little closer to Lucas. “That’s creepy. It feels so dead.”

“This is nothing. You should’ve seen it in the Upside Down,” Dustin remarked. “Even the reflections are weird.”

Will tensed. “Weird how?”

“I dunno. Dead-eyed. Don’t quite match up.” Dustin shrugged. “I didn’t spend a whole lot of time there.”

Thank god for that, Lucas commented silently.

“I think you found your Shade,” Will said quietly. “Did he say anything to you?”

“If it had spoken, it wouldn’t have struck me as a reflection,” Dustin pointed out. “So that’s a no. You think I found my pocket dimension self?”

“Nerds. Focus,” Mick directed. “Kali, Jane. Y’all have a plan?” The two nodded. “Great.”

“Hey, where’s your spikey haired friend?” Dustin asked suddenly. “I haven’t seen him since - yesterday, I think.”

“Axel is out. Running errands,” Kali replied shortly. “Will, follow us into the cellar. Everyone else, stay here.”

“Why did we all need to come if we’re just staying out here, anyway?” Max demanded.

Mick raised her eyebrows. “You got something better to do?”

“I mean, no, but I could probably figure something out.”

“Dustin and I are here for scientific backup!” Dottie crowed. “This is _exciting!_ ”

Lucas wasn’t sure that was the word he’d use. Well, actually, he was sure it _wasn’t_ , he just wasn’t sure what he’d call it instead.

Maddening, perhaps, as his eyes kept drifting back over to Max and Mike, standing awkwardly apart yet seeming to drift together. He still had so many questions -

Especially what Max had meant this morning when they said Mike was in love with him. He’d never really let himself hope; wanting Max was hard enough when he could never figure out how they felt about him. It seemed to change like the tide.

At approximately the time he decided to go over and talk to them, his focus was broken by a plaintive wail.

Kali left the cellar, followed by Will holding Jane against his shoulder. The girl looked far too young for her age, quivering in Will’s arms. Mike hurried forward to meet them.

“Didn’t work,” Kali said succinctly. Like there was nothing else to say.

“Why?” he asked. She shrugged. “Is Jane okay?” 

“She’ll be fine,” Kali replied, which was not a reasonable answer, but he was getting the feeling Kali didn’t quite understand children.

Will came over with Jane in his arms and blood on his shirt. It was diluted by tears and Jane was sniffling. Definitely not okay, then.

“What happened?’ he asked quietly. 

“She said it felt like trying to close a box made of razor blades.” Will tilted his head. “Well, not in those words, but that’s how I understood it.” He absently ran his hand over Jane’s back. “I said if it hurts, she should stop. Kali suggested she try and push through” - Lucas was getting a pretty clear picture of how Kali had grown up - “but Jane said she couldn’t. That it was pushing back.”

Lucas glanced over at Kali and her crew. Mick was talking to her with crossed arms and a frown, but Kali had a stubborn look on her face he was used to seeing on Max.

“It’s okay,” Lucas soothed. He was no child psychologist, but he had to take some youth-focused courses to get his degree. Besides, it didn’t take a genius to know that a kid who grew up a test subject had problems with failure. “It’s okay, Jane. You did your best. You never have to do anything that hurts you, okay? You tried. Nobody’s mad at you.”

Jane turned towards him to sniffle. “Kali’s mad.” She had blood and snot and tears all over her face, and Lucas was glad they were next to his car so he could reach into the glove box and grab some tissues. 

“She’s not,” he promised, even though she might’ve been. “She’s just frustrated because she wants all this to be over. She’s tired.” 

“Me too,” Jane answered, tilting her face into his touch as he cleaned her up with a tissue. “You know everything.”

Lucas laughed. “Hardly.”

Jane shook her head, and then said again, insistently. “You know everything.” She reached out and tapped his forehead, then next to his eyes. “You see everything.”

It was oddly flattering. “Yeah, I do see a lot.” 

Jane gestured over at Max, Mike, and Dustin, then back to Will. “You see them.”

Lucas wasn’t quite sure what she meant by that, but he sure as hell tried. “Why don’t we have another chat like we did last night, when we get home? You can tell me about your feelings, and how you grew up.” 

She nodded. “Chocolate?” she asked, because apparently Lucas was starting a bad habit of rewarding emotional vulnerability with sweets. 

But he couldn’t say no to those big eyes. He smiled softly. “Yeah, you can have some chocolate.”

Kali came back over. “Thanks for coming,” she said stiffly, like it wasn’t her idea. “Please take Jane home with you. We’ll return eventually.”

Lucas raised an eyebrow. “Where are you going?”

“We have a job to do.” Kali turned around and walked away before he could ask anything else.

He shared a long-suffering glance with Will and sighed. “Alright, everyone back in the car.” He made shoo-ing motions with his hands. “I think our two psychics need naps.”

“I’m fine!” Will insisted, but he was swaying a little on his feet. Nobody looked convinced, and Mike hurried over to help support him and take Jane. Will didn’t look capable of holding a child’s weight, no matter how small.

Mike wound up taking Jane in his lap in the front seat, tucked up against him and under Lucas’ emergency blanket. Will was asleep on Dustin’s shoulder in minutes, and Jane fell asleep from where she was pressed into Mike. 

_“We make sweet love every night, and we’re going to get married and raise biracial adopted babies and destroy the very fabric of American culture.”_

It was only something Mike had said to piss Neil off, and yet for a brief moment, Lucas had been able to see that future stretch out before him. And now, with Jane in his lap, he looked like he’d make an excellent father. 

Lucas held back a groan. God, he was fucked. He’d been fucked for a very long time. 

_“He’s in love with you!”_ Max had insisted, and yet it had been them in his bed, with their mouth on his neck, and Lucas sleeping alone. 

It was fine. He pulled his eyes back to the road. He’d make his peace with it eventually, and maybe by the end of this whole monster movie, they could at least all be friends again.

It’d been enough for him once. Lucas was sure he could get it to be enough again.


	8. The Past is now Ashes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warnings for this chapter include: Suicide, brief discussion of white supremacy and police brutality, intense violence, child abuse, oblique references to past sexual assault

Nancy was emerging from the Post Office when the familiar and completely out-of-place black van roared around the corner. She had paper cuts on her hands from copying, folding, and mailing her article to all the biggest outlets - she was particularly optimistic about the Chicago Sun-Times, and Murray had promised to pull some strings - but all thoughts of going home and collapsing left her brain as she hurried to intercept it.

Miraculously, the van stopped for her and Mick rolled down the window. “What’s up?” she asked, drumming her fingers on the wheel slightly impatiently. 

“What are you doing?” Nancy demanded, because she could never keep herself away from a good story.

“We’ve got business,” Kali snapped from the passenger seat, frowning. “Urgent business. You have ninety seconds.”

Nancy used seventy-five of those seconds to think about the direction they’d come from and where they were going, and what ‘urgent business’ likely meant. She used the last fifteen seconds to say, “Take me with you.”

Kali and Mick exchanged a look and seemed to have an entire silent conversation. Mick looked far more worried than Kali; if it was an argument, Kali had definitely won. 

“You got a weapon?” she asked Nancy.

Nancy snorted. Why the hell would she just carry a weapon around in Hawkins? “I can shoot a gun,” she replied, because that seemed the more relevant part of the question. 

Jonathan had taught her, when they were in high school. He’d mentioned it once and she hadn’t stopped badgering him until he’d taken her out behind his house to practice. 

She’d surpassed him within the hour.

Kali shrugged. “We’ve got extra. Get in,” she directed, and the back of the van swung open before Nancy could ask how she was supposed to do that. She clambered inside. 

“Don’t you have a concussion?” Mick asked, glancing at Nancy in the rearview mirror. “Shouldn’t you be at home, resting?” 

“How did you know that?” she asked, squinting. “No, I’m fine.” And she was, really. It was like no head trauma had ever occurred. 

“Your boyfriend doesn’t think so,” Mick replied skeptically. 

“He’s my husband, actually.” Nancy felt honor-bound to correct her.

Kali snorted a laugh. “Nah, the other one.”

It hit Nancy that they were referring to Jonathan, and a blush threatened to take over her entire face. She chose not to engage any further and simply insisted she was fine again.

The man sitting on a bench across from her - Funshine, she thought he was called - offered her a handgun. She smiled winningly at him, and earned a small smile in return.

“Where’s your other friend?” Nancy asked, counting only four of five punks in the van. 

“Axel’s meeting us there with the supplies.” Dottie was grinning like mad. 

Nancy had pieced together that they were going to the lab, and that they were clearly expecting some kind of violent altercation, but she hadn’t quite figured out why yet. Kali’s shoulders were drawn taut like a bowstring, as were Mick’s, but while Mick looked concerned, Kali seemed overcome by a wild sort of anticipation.

Nancy shivered. 

When it came down to it, she didn’t really care why. Or, she did, because Nancy needed to know everything always, but it wouldn’t make a difference to her. She was going in and she was going to look in the eyes of the man who was responsible for her best friend’s death (probably) and she was going to get some sort of closure.

“Just so you know,” Kali began as they pulled up to the building, “I’m going to kill him. Don’t get in my way.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Nancy replied, sliding out of the back. Mick raised an eyebrow, like she’d expected Nancy to have more reservations about revenge-killing, but she was new around here so her ignorance of Nancy’s character could be forgiven. 

The building was unlocked and empty. Out of the corner of her eye, Nancy would swear she saw something over by the reception desk, but Kali was setting an unforgiving pace onwards. Mick glanced where Nancy had been looking, but she bit her tongue and kept walking, so Nancy followed her lead. 

The building looked abandoned in a staged sort of way, with doors to offices open and empty shelves everywhere. Nancy wished suddenly for her pen and pad, or more accurately for Jonathan’s camera, but she wasn’t here to be a journalist. She was here to be Kali’s soldier, she reminded herself as they made their way to a stairwell, her fingers curled carefully around the grip of her borrowed gun. She’d asked to join this mission, so she damn well better carry it through.

A soft, colorful glow blanketed the room eerily as Kali pushed open the door. There was no regular lighting - everything was LEDs and machine displays, and on the other side of the lab, a pulsing, buzzing monstrosity of metal before a molten wall.

“What the _fuck_ is that?” Mick hissed. “I don’t like this, Kal.” 

Nancy had to agree. They’d expected - someone. Anyone. Instead, this lab looked just as abandoned as the offices upstairs, but in a distinctly threatening way. 

“No shit,” was Kali’s curt response. “Dottie?”

“On it.” The girl was fast, Nancy realized, because she was already in front of the rest of them as she’d started talking, and in another couple strides, she was across the room. 

In spite of the fact that her cloud of bleach blonde hair and colorful scarves should’ve made her impossible to miss, Nancy realized that Dottie was impeccable at hiding. The girl stayed low and moved quickly, eyes scanning continually, and in this light, the scarves provided camouflage. In fact, she was nigh impossible to find against the technicolor plasma of the wall behind her. 

She gestured for the rest of them to join her as she started poking at the machine. 

It reminded Nancy of Dustin, the way he didn’t care that things were nearly guaranteed to blow up in his face, even now when he was a full grown adult. Yet like Dustin, Dottie moved with a careful precision that somehow left everything unexploded, even as she tugged at wires and popped pieces open at frightening speeds. 

“It’s emitting a high-frequency wave,” she began.

“Obviously,” Kali scoffed, but Nancy couldn’t tell why it was supposed to be obvious. Judging by Dottie’s knit brows, she didn’t either. “What does it do, though?”

“No, hold on. What do you mean, obviously?” Dottie demanded. 

Kali stilled. “Are you telling me you can’t hear that god awful noise?” They shook their heads. “It’s been screaming in my head since I opened the door.”

Dottie started the chew on the end of one of her scarves. “Well, if you can hear us and none of the rest of us can, it probably has something to do with the dimensions.” She turned and reached out to touch the wall, pulling back with a hiss. “Ow. Shit.”

Mick sighed. “Dottie!”

“It’s the fastest scientific method!” Dottie defended. “Hey, Kali, what color is that wall?”

Kali looked at her like she was on drugs. “Black.”

Nancy startled. It was certainly not black. The wall was a glowing red-orange cascade that hurt her eyes to look at.

“Just black?” Dottie prompted.

“No, I mean - there’s some purple, and it’s all kind of wavy - it looks like The In-Between place.”

Dottie nodded once, decisively. “That’s cuz it is.”

Funshine put his hand up. “Are you saying that Kali can see the place she goes, even while the rest of us just see fire?”

Dottie nodded again. “The frequency is disrupting the particles of the dimensions, kind of...mushing and shaking them together.”

Nancy’s brow creased. “That doesn’t make sense - how -?”

“Well, listen, some of us are self-taught scientists, ma’am.” Dottie didn’t snap, but there was an unfamiliar edge to her voice and her smile seemed brittle. “If you have a better explanation, please, go ahead.”

Nancy held up her hands in surrender. “No, you’re clearly the expert here. I just don’t understand how Kali sees something different than we do.”

Dottie gave a snorting laugh. “Me fucking neither, this is weird as shit. I’m just telling you what’s happening.

It was honestly a pretty wholesome moment, laughing about weird science and the way the world didn’t make sense, illuminated by the glow of some machine that probably shouldn’t even exist.

So of course it all had to go to shit.

“Mantis Shrimp can have anywhere from twelve to sixteen different photoreceptors, compared to the three that we humans have.” The emergent man’s voice was smug and slimy, but cold at the same time, making Nancy wince. This had to be Brenner. “Dearest Subject Eight -”

“My name is Kali,” she cut him off. “And I’m not your ‘dearest’ anything.”

“If we want to talk names, that’s not what your parents named you.”

“They weren’t my parents, they were two cowards who stole me from my mother and then left the country and handed me off to a monster when I was more than they could handle.” Kali’s jaw was set and her spine straight, and she looked every inch the warrior goddess whose name she shared. “My _name_ is _Kali_.”

Dottie waved her hand to attract attention, in some strange facsimile of a grade school classroom. “I wanna know what the fuck is up with the shrimp,” she declared. “What’s your point, creepy science man?” 

His smirk soured for a moment. “The shrimp have a wider range to their sense of sight than we do. So too, _Kali_.” He managed to make her name sound like an insult, dripping with disdain. “If you attempt any trans-dimensional travel, you’ll burn yourself to ashes. I had one...rather unfortunate girl try it, once, many years ago. She was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, stumbled into the portal. Pity.” Brenner sighed with false sympathy.

Nancy felt herself steaming. It had to be Barb.

“Kali, however, can perceive the pathways between dimensions,” Brenner finished.

“So you’re saying Kali’s a shrimp?” Dottie asked with false consternation. “Seems pretty human to me.”

Nancy bit back a smile in spite of her righteous rage for her best friend.

“It’s a metaphor, child,” Brenner replied derisively.

“Oh, yeah, I’ve heard of those.” Dottie played the idiot quite well, and it was wildly entertaining. “So, what, this thing wiggles up the air and makes the pathways obvious?”

Brenner gave a long-suffering sigh. “Something like that,” he replied. “It’s far too complicated for you to understand, young lady, but this machine stabilizes the pathway.”

“Doesn’t look too stable to me,” Dottie pointed out, jerking a thumb at the wavering wall.

“It’s not _quite_ finished, of course, but there is at least one pathway that _any_ of us could walk through, should we choose. My daughter helped me build it before she…” he trailed off, searching for the right word. “Ran off.”

“Escaped,” Kali corrected flatly. “And she’s not your daughter.”

“Genetics say otherwise, dear.” Brenner offered a wolfish smile.

“Blood isn’t what makes a family,” Funshine said quietly, drawing Brenner’s attention for the first time. “Genetics don’t mean shit.”

Again, Brenner’s smirk soured. Nancy appreciated the effect Kali’s crew seemed to have on the man, because he was a bit more bearable when his face mirrored the distaste she felt for him. 

“Anyway.” Brenner redirected. “Since you’re back, Subject Eight -”

“Kali,” Nancy corrected, earning a small smile. 

Brenner rolled his eyes. “You can help me finish the final steps.”

“Not a chance,” Kali replied, glaring. “I’ve come to end this.”

He tutted. “You always were so dramatic.” She managed two steps forward and leveled her gun at his forehead. “Remember, the pathway is open.” He smirked.

“Motherfucker!” Dottie shouted, then, “Scatter!” Nancy whipped around to see one of the monsters emerging from the wall. 

“You can’t possibly hope to control that,” Mick shouted, horrified. 

“I hardly need to, dear. I just need it to follow its nature.” 

Kali snarled. “You should worry more about _my_ nature,” she replied. Two more emerged from the wall. “Go, all of you, now!”

Nancy took off without question, not checking where the others were. She trusted them more than she trusted herself, though she had a moment to glance back as she caught her foot on a tangle of wires and went down hard. No one had moved very far, but Kali was - glowing. Or something. 

Nancy pushed herself to her feet and kept running.

_Go. Now. Go._ Her head was killing her and her ankle was almost definitely sprained, but her feet beat heavily on the metal flooring and she ran through the pain, to the rhythm of Kali's last shouts. She hated to leave them behind, especially knowing what she did about Barb, but she knew she was worth more by getting help. She also knew that in here, she was little more than a liability. If she could just get to Jane and Will...

The door to the stairwell was jammed but not locked. Two strong shoves and a possibly dislocated shoulder later, Nancy was ascending, up and up and up until she collided with another human being.

“You're not supposed to be here!” he protested. He looked like a low level scientist, probably a guy just trying to make ends meet. 

Of course, he was violating the Geneva Convention to do so, so there was also that.

“Yeah, I know.” She figured direct honesty was most expedient. “But you don't want to be here either, Brenner's on a warpath.” Okay, maybe not direct honesty, she didn’t know if he knew about the monster.

“Probably because of you!” he sputtered. 

Nancy shrugged. “Only partially.” Mostly it was Kali’s fault, though Dottie was also a strong contender on chaos. 

The man growled and reached for Nancy’s shoulder and - yep, _definitely_ dislocated. Nancy was pretty sure he would’ve said some grunt-level dialogue too, had she not whipped out her borrowed gun and shot him in the shoulder. See how he liked it.

“Don't fucking touch me,” she hissed as he stumbled back into the wall. Then, without another word, she continued her race up the stairs.

The nice thing about a lab that was supposed to have been shut down for over a decade was that security was terrible. When Nancy made it to ground level, it was empty but for ghosts, and the emergency exit clicked open without even a single alarm.

Nancy collapsed to the ground, wheezing, and winced at the various painful parts of her body. Fuck, she was tired, but she had to keep going - she had to tell Jane and the others -

The edges of her vision got dark and fuzzy.

“ _Nancy!_ ”

Oh. Auditory hallucinations had to be a pretty bad sign. Nancy considered, finally, _maybe_ , that Steve and Jonathan may have had a point. Perhaps.

Suddenly, she was being crushed between two bodies and she screamed as white-hot pain flooded every inch of her. 

“Shh, shh, I’m sorry,” Steve babbled. He knew immediately what was wrong because years of athletics had made him good at this sort of thing, and Nancy thanked god she’d married a jock. “Jon, hold her. Baby, this is gonna suck.”

He was right, it definitely sucked, but he managed to pop her shoulder back where it belonged and then she collapsed to the ground between them, sobbing. 

“Will said - God, Nance - so worried -” Their voices overlapped and her body ached as she sobbed. She couldn’t tell who was on what side, where she ended and they began none of it.

“We need -” she gasped out. “We need to tell the others. Kali needs help.”

She could feel Jonathan and Steve having a silent conversation above her, but she couldn’t see through her tears well enough to guess what it might be. “Yeah. Yeah, okay,” Steve said, and then scooped her up in his arms.

God, he was warm. He was warm and he smelled like Jonathan’s soap as she buried her face in his neck.

No. Wait. This was Jonathan. Christ, her head was killing her. 

She rode in the backseat, laid down with her head in Jonathan’s lap, trying not to cry anymore. She was tired of crying.

“You’re so fucking stupid,” one of them said, probably Steve because Jonathan never talked to her like that. “Jesus, Nancy, what were you thinking?”

“Had to,” she mumbled, and then half-fell asleep for the rest of the ride home.

Steve and Jonathan managed to support her into the house. They insisted she lay down, but she had to get to the phone, to call and warn Mike -

Nancy leaned heavily against the wall with the phone to her ear, sweating, but she did it. 

“Hello?” 

It was Dustin. Okay.

“The lab,” Nancy ground out. “There’s this - machine. You’ll know what to do with it. Go now. Kali - needs help.”

“On it!” Dustin replied, then slammed down the phone. 

Nancy sagged. 

“Easy, easy.” Strong arms caught her and she turned, leaning in to collapse against Steve and kiss his neck.

Except Steve was, once again, Jonathan, and Nancy had definitely misjudged something somewhere along the line and bitten him. 

“Jesus, Nancy.” He startled, and then all of a sudden nothing seemed to matter anymore, she’d almost fucking died, and she took his face in her hands and she kissed him until she was dizzy from lack of oxygen.

He was panting, too. “ _Jesus_ , Nancy,” he said with more panic and emphasis. “What-”

“Do I get one of those?” Steve asked, and the rest of Nancy’s concussed brain caught up with the reason she’d never kissed Jonathan like that until now.

She stumbled, and Jonathan pulled back as if burned. “Steve, I -”

“I was asking Jonathan,” Steve cut in with lightness that even a concussed Nancy could tell was deliberate. “No offense, Nance, but we’re married; I can get a kiss like that from you anytime I want.”

Jonathan’s face had turned a very pretty shade of pink and showed no sign of returning to its original hue. “Steve, I -”

Steve crossed the room and did the little thing he did with his shoulders that Nancy knew meant he was psyching himself up for something. Then, before Jonathan could say anything further, Steve cut him off with a kiss.

“I think,” Nancy said softly, with more confidence than she’d ever felt. “I think maybe it’s time we talk about this.”

* * *

Lucas couldn’t help it, he was worried about Kali.

Dustin had conveyed Nancy’s stilted message and the rest of them were getting into Lucas’ car without any hesitation. Jane sat in Max’s lap, this time, and kicked Mike’s seat at their quiet encouragement, and that was the only bit of normalcy.

They had no idea what they were getting into, only that Kali needed help and that Nancy sounded near death. They had one rifle from Mike’s place, a baseball bat, and a box of tools. Dustin insisted the wrench would be useful. 

Lucas also had a handgun in his glove box. He _really_ didn’t want to use it, but he would if he had to. He’d keep his people safe. 

_Especially_ Jane. The girl deserved so much more than the life she’d had, and Lucas would readily admit he had a soft spot for kids, especially the trauma cases.

Mike was drumming his fingers on his knee and Lucas was struck by an urge he hadn’t had since high school to reach out and grab Mike’s hand. He didn’t want to interfere with whatever Mike and Max were working out, but the stakes were high. 

So his thoughts pinballed back and forth between his love life and Kali, and he wasn’t sure which was worse. 

Because Kali had eyes he’d seen on a lot of people, back when he was doing his internship in Chicago. Haunted. Angry. Desperate. The people who looked like that - well. Sometimes Lucas got to them in time. Sometimes, he got them resources and helped them claw their way out of the darkness so that pain and desperation in their eyes smoothed away.

Sometimes, he wasn’t so lucky. 

He’d only ever lost one patient. The last Lucas had seen of the boy was that exact look in his eyes as he left his appointment. He committed suicide-by-cop less than 48 hours later. 

Lucas would be damned if Jane lost her sister today. If Mick lost her girlfriend. He’d promised himself. 

Never again.

He was getting real fucking sick of this building, Lucas reflected as he threw his car into park on the grass. He reached across Mike into the glove compartment.

“What the fuck is that?” Mike’s eyes were round as marbles. 

Lucas raised an eyebrow. “You know what this is.” He slipped the gun into the back of his jeans and tried not to think too hard about the way Mike swallowed thickly. 

“Well, yeah, but - why do you have it?”

Lucas would get used to being surrounded by white people again, he told himself. It would just take time. 

“There are certain parts of the country you don’t want to be in after the sun sets,” Lucas replied carefully. “Even towns in Indiana. And I’ve broken down one too many times to take my chances.”

“Oh.” Mike’s jaw snapped shut. 

Jesus, he was lucky he was cute. 

“Are you explaining Sundown Towns to him?” Max asked, carrying Jane on their back.

“‘Sundown Towns’?” Mike asked, wrinkling his nose. 

Lucas scrubbed a hand over his face. “We do _not_ have time for this right now,” he groaned. “Get out of here alive and I promise I’ll give you every book on Critical Race Theory I own, but for now, let’s fucking go.”

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Dustin and Will holding hands. At least someone was getting their shit figured out in all this.

“I cannot believe we are walking into a boss battle with a twelve-year-old on piggy-back,” Dustin commented. “This feels wildly irresponsible.”

Max snorted. “It’s not like we have much of a choice.” They adjusted Jane on their back. “At least she gets to have some fun before going to save her foster sister from her abusive dad and trying to repair a fucking hole in the universe or something.”

“Fun.” Jane nodded solemnly.

The building was empty and eerily still. Max and Lucas spotted the body of the dead receptionist at the same time - one dark red hole in the middle of her forehead - and hurried quickly past before Jane could see it. Lucas wasn’t completely sure what the correct number of dead bodies for a twelve year old to see was, but he’d put money down on it being zero, so they were already well past that and into damage control.

They didn’t encounter anyone on the way to the stairwell. It felt too easy, and Lucas was intensely suspicious. His suspicion eased slightly as they made it into the lower levels and saw a couple of scientists through the window, but it still didn’t feel like a proper confrontation. It ought to be more dramatic than this, with low-level grunts and stuff; obstacles to overcome.

Granted, he knew Rambo was not a reliable source.

Somehow, the five of them managed to get through the door without attracting attention. They squatted down, and Jane clapped her hands over her ears. Will winced.

“What _is_ that?” he demanded.

Lucas glanced around. “What’s what?”

“That high pitched -” Will broke off and shoved his hands over his ears too. 

Dustin glanced around and found something of note. “It’s probably that machine,” he suggested, pointing. “I bet that’s what Jane meant by ‘Big Buzz.’ I’m going to go take a closer look.”

Before Lucas could protest that was a fucking terrible idea, Dustin was already a good ten feet away. He swore as quietly as he could and hissed at the others, “Stay here.” 

Lucas pondered why everyone he loved was so recklessly stupid as he crept forward after Dustin. The new angle put him directly in the line of sight of some of the scientists, were they to turn back from their work, so Lucas prayed they wouldn’t notice him or Dustin and did his best.

The new angle also put him in a position where he could see Kali standing in front of the machine. She was unarmed - _why_ was she unarmed? - and looking up at Brenner on a raised platform across the pathway, their argument echoing slightly. He wasn’t sure how that didn’t disturb the other scientists, but he caught one looking over at Brenner and then quickly snapping back to their work and realized it definitely did.

Kali was here to kill him, then. It wasn’t hard for Lucas to figure that one out. But he couldn’t see Mick or any of the rest of them, and Kali looked wounded, like she’d been slashed by talons. Dark blood dripped on the floor.

This wasn’t looking good. 

They were too far away to hear what she said, but Kali made one last dramatic declaration, whirled around, and drove a previously-concealed knife straight into the body of the machine and _pulled_. For a minute nothing happened, and then sparks flew and the room shook and smoke filled the air and the giant tangle of parts and wires exploded. 

Or perhaps it was an implosion. The force of it knocked Lucas back on his feet, but it pulled as well, making strange patterns in the air. The scientists were shouting now, running away, and the rest of the Party quickly scrambled closer to avoid the fleeing workers. Jane was still on Max’s back, right up until the second she wasn’t, running towards the clearing smoke and the charred rubble.

“Sister!” she screamed, but there wasn’t even a body to be found.

“Subject Eleven,” Brenner greeted. “Welcome home.” He seemed entirely unruffled by the ruin of his machine or the death of his other test subject; at most, he expressed mild annoyance and wiped some dust off his lab coat. 

And, because as mentioned Lucas loved a bunch of reckless stupid fools, Mike was up there with her in a second, shouting back, “Her name is Jane.”

He couldn’t blame the guy, but he also knew Mike didn’t have anything to defend them with, and his willow tree of a body would do nothing in a fight.

So, even though Rambo was acknowledged as an unreliable source, Lucas steeled himself, stood up, and walked casually over to where Mike shielded Jane. “And this isn’t her home,” he added, because it seemed appropriate (and cool).

The rest of them joined too, keeping a loose, protective circle around the girl. 

“My, it seems like today’s the day where I get not one, but two ragtag groups of friends come to visit!” Brenner smiled, but it was too sharp and mirthless. “And this one has returned my daughter to me.”

“She’s not your daughter,” Max ground out, crossing their arms over her chest. 

Jane, though, pushed her way to the front of the group. “Papa?” she asked softly. 

“I think you’ll find she is,” Brenner replied smugly. “Are you ready to come home now, Janey?”

She pulled a face. “You hurt sister,” she accused.

“No, you misunderstand,” Brenner said, smooth as oil. “She hurt herself. I told her my machine was dangerous, that she shouldn’t touch it - and now look what happened to her.” He tsked. “But don’t worry. If you come home, I’ll make sure all your new friends stay safe.”

Jane looked around dubiously, at all the adults surrounding her. God, she was just a kid. Lucas didn’t believe the man for a second, but she looked desperately like she wanted to. After all, this man was the closest thing she had to a father. Of course she loved him. Of course she wanted to go home.

Of course she wanted to believe he’d stop hurting her. 

“And you, my friend.” Lucas startled as Brenner pointed, but the man was pointing behind him, to Dustin.

Dustin startled. “Me?” His eyes widened. 

“Yes, you.” Brenner laughed; to anyone else, it probably sounded real and jovial, but Lucas could see through it. “You look like a man of science.”

“I am,” Dustin replied cautiously. 

“You can help me prove it to El - Jane, then,” Brenner offered. “You can help me rebuild the machine, make it _better_. Show the world what science can accomplish. I’m so close to finishing my research - parallel dimensions, can you imagine? Well, of course you can. And a bright young man like yourself would be a valuable asset to my team.”

God help them all, Dustin looked like he was slightly considering it. “Tell me about it,” he demanded. “Why should I believe you? Why shouldn’t I try to accomplish it on my own?”

“Because that machine there is nearly perfect - or it was, anyhow.” Brenner pursed his lips. “It works because -” 

Lucas half-tuned out the science jargon as Brenner and Dustin started to talk shop. He wondered if Dustin realized he was being helpful or if this was just a by-product of his intense desire to make a great scientific discovery. He took the time to scope out the exits.

“What if you wanted to close the door, then?” Dustin asked.

Brenner sighed, exasperated. “That is the _opposite_ of the point of this machine. The research itself, even. The door already wants to close! We have far more to gain by making and keeping it accessible.”

That was good to know, at least. With the machine broken, maybe Jane would be able to close up the portals herself now.

“So, what do you say?” he offered. “Jane comes home to Papa, your new friend gets a job, and all the rest of your new friends get to leave unharmed.”

Like the child she was, Jane sat down on the floor to ponder.

* * *

Will had barely been present for the duration of the conversation. Once the machine was destroyed, the terrible noise stopped, but then his head felt oddly empty, and things were fundamentally incorrect about the fabric of this place.

But he knew one thing. “Jane,” he began softly. “Do you trust me?”

She glanced back and up from where she was sitting on the floor, legs crossed, hands folded, the picture of decorum. “Yes.”

“You know how I can see things about the future, sometimes?” Will asked, sitting down next to her. “Like when I knew I was going to find you.” She nodded. “Your Papa is lying.”

She frowned. “Lies are bad.”

“Yes, they are. If you stay here with him, he will keep hurting you, and we won’t be able to leave anyway.”

That part didn’t require True Sight. That part was just basic psychology. 

“Have you been to the other side?” Will asked. She nodded. “It’s scary, right? You can feel the world is sick?”

“ _Bad_ ,” she agreed. 

“If your Papa builds the machine again, that sickness will spread here. The monsters will come with it, too.” 

He’d never actually tried interpreting the vague feelings he got into verbal prophecies, so he was kind of feeling around helplessly, but it still felt...correct, when he said those words. 

Brenner made a noise in the back of his throat. “I’m waiting.”

Will closed his eyes and with some effort, he shifted. In the In-Between space, he could see what was happening with all of his friends, but he could also see what was happening on the other side. The two were close - so far as anything could be close in this dimensional space - and Will got the feeling they were _too_ close as the edges of one overlapped the other.

There was supposed to be a barrier between the two of them. Well, okay then. He’d rebuild the barrier. Kali hadn’t taught him how, but he’d watched Jane do it at Waffle House. It was sort of like weaving, in a way, but using the weird sixth sense Kali had explained earlier. It seemed to help when he closed his eyes - it had been hard enough to get here in the first place, with all the lights and noise - so he blocked out all the sense he could and he wove.

Or at least he tried to. He came back into himself screaming, startling Jane and his friends, not to mention himself. He hadn’t tried to get back to the world, but here he was.

“Will, what happened?” Dustin was on his knees. “Are you hurt?”

He groaned. “I tried - to fix the boundary between the worlds - but when I touched it -” He winced. There were no burn marks on his body but he still felt them. “It was so _hot_.”

“Motion generates heat,” Brenner said conversationally. Will startled, unaware the man had been able to hear, and his next words caused shivers. “You know, it was hard to replicate a corpse for you. You should’ve stayed gone. Are we finished now?”

Jane scowled. “No.” She closed her eyes, and Will assumed she tried to do what he could not. Her shoulders shook and her face twisted in pain. 

“Jane, Jane, you don’t have to do this now.” Will pulled her into his lap, curling around her protectively. “It’s okay, we’ll figure it out.”

_Bang._

Jane’s head jerked up so fast she smacked it on Will’s chin. He could feel his tongue bleeding, but that was hardly the most important thing. 

“Mike!” Max shouted, bent over where the man was sprawled out on the floor clutching his hip. 

Brenner held his gun casually. Will hadn’t even noticed it in the first place, and now it had hurt his best friend. 

The man leaned into the railing. “I think it’s time to end our negotiations.”

Lucas’ face was swallowed by a cold, protective fury as he reached behind his back and pulled out a gun of his own. “Tell me why I shouldn’t pull the trigger,” he demanded, pointing straight at Brenner’s forehead. Only Will could notice the way his arms shook, but Lucas stood steadfast.

“Because I’m quicker than you,” Brenner replied with a smirk. 

Before anyone could say another word, three demogorgons appeared out of thin air. Jane shrieked. 

“Well, that makes my job easier,” Brenner commented. “Thanks, boys.”

Inanely, Will wondered if these creatures had any sort of internal concept of gender, or if they were sentient at all, but now was really not the time for that.

“Can’t -” Jane gritted her teeth, reaching out. Will was still holding onto her in a half-lift. “Can’t touch.”

She wouldn’t be able to snap these necks like she did at the house. Shit. 

Guess it was time for Will to learn a new skill. His friends lives’ were depending on him.

“Lucas, cover me,” he demanded, because a gun was the next most effective weapon, and then he shoved Jane behind him towards Max and _reached_.

There was nothing there. 

He could scream in frustration; the only solace was that the demogorgons had clearly decided Brenner seemed a more attractive target, because all three began to converge on him. So it didn’t matter that Will was incompetent, or that Jane couldn’t use her powers, at least for the moment.

Brenner’s smile started to falter, finally, and Will couldn’t help his grim satisfaction. 

Jane reached out again, but she still couldn’t do anything. “Papa,” she whimpered. 

Oh. Of course she was worried about her father, no matter what he’d put her through.

“Lucas -” Will began, but he was kneeling beside a bleeding and paler than usual Mike right now. “Lucas, give me your gun.”

It was an inelegant and distracted handoff, but Will got his finger on the trigger and fired at one of the demogorgons. He was a good shot, and they were massive targets, so it had to do...something. 

Brenner grunted and stumbled, dropping his own gun. The monsters continued unaffected for another minute before they abruptly disappeared. 

None of the last three minutes made any goddamn sense. Will was starting to form a suspicion, but his attention was pulled by the arrival of three new figures. 

“You’re under arrest, Dr. Martin Brenner,” Hopper declared, emerging from behind the man. “You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law.” He pulled a pair of cuffs off his belt and used them to lock the man up. “You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be provided for you.”

Brenner was back to giving that smug smirk, but Will was comforted by the fact there was at least a little pain visible through it. “On what charges?” he demanded. 

“Child endangerment,” suggested Karen Wheeler. “And abuse.”

“Basically violating the entire Geneva Convention,” added Joyce.

“Anything that’ll stick,” finished Hopper.

Brenner smirked. “So nothing, then.” Joyce made an indignant noise, but Brenner directed his attention towards Hopper. “C’mon, Chief, you know the government will never let you take me to trial; I’ll be out in an instant. This is a farce.”

Will’s stomach turned, but now was not the time to get sick with the corruption of the US Government. 

“So what do you suggest, then?” Hopper asked, apparently not even willing to pretend they had a chance.

“I’m sure we can all come to a nice little deal,” Brenner replied. “Something mutually beneficial. You get what you want, I get what I want, we all walk away happy.”

Will glanced over at his injured friend, who deserved medical attention must sooner than a negotiation. He did not like the sound of this at all.

* * *

Mike was bleeding on the ground, a bullet hole in his leg, and Max was panicking. 

They hated themself for it, because they were trained for this, they had no reason to panic, but Mike just looked so sick and they didn’t have any of their supplies and oh, fuck, they loved him.

They were vaguely aware that Hopper was over there making deals with the devil and they couldn’t say they approved, but their priority was staining the metal in front of them.

“Why won’t you stop fucking bleeding?” they demanded, trying to keep their voice steady as they applied pressure to his hip. “You picked a garbage place to get shot.”

Mike rolled his eyes. “Sorry,” he gritted out. “I’ll try to - be more convenient - next time.”

“Well, at least you’re okay enough to make jokes,” Lucas sighed, carding his hands through Mike’s hair. “Dumbass.”

“It wasn’t even my fault this time!” Mike protested, his indignation letting him force it all out in one breath. “Ow, _Jesus_ , Max. You’re pushing -”

Max refused to apologize because the bleeding had finally started to slow down.

“Yeah, but when you run headfirst into danger all the time, statistically this was doomed to happen.” Lucas was walking the thin line between teasing and terrified. Max wasn’t sure anyone else would notice, but they did. 

Mike rolled his eyes towards the ceiling, though the effect was undercut by the sweat beaded on his forehead. “Yeah, well, at least it was me and not one of you guys.”

“Oh, no, we are not doing this self-sacrificing bullshit right now, Michael Wheeler,” Max snapped. “You are just as valuable and important as the rest of us.”

They could tell Mike remained entirely unconvinced. “That’s not -” Before he could get more than two words out, Lucas leaned over and kissed him.

Max’s eyebrows went all the way up. It was proven fact that this was the only way to shut Mike up, they just didn’t expect Lucas to do it.

“You’re annoying as hell with that whole complex and I am _not_ gonna lose you,” Lucas panted after he pulled away.

Mike’s face was bright red. Max wasn’t quite sure of the physiology of blushing, but they hoped all the blood being in his face meant that there was less to fall out the hole in his side. “Oh,” he said softly.

Max wrenched their eyes away and turned back to look at Brenner, letting Mike and Lucas have their moment and firmly _not_ thinking about said moment’s implications. 

They didn’t enjoy the scene unfolding up there any better. There were some complex negotiations happening, and it sounded like Chief Hopper was actually debating allowing Brenner to keep custody of Jane. Max shivered, thinking of Neil, and swore they wouldn’t let it come to that. Joyce and Karen seemed to share the same opinion, glaring at Hopper.

“Chief, you _know_ I’m not going to stop doing experiments; science is a part of who I am.” Brenner sounded entirely too smug for a man in cuffs, in Max’s opinion. 

Hopper sighed. “Is there a way to convince you to do science that won’t run the risk of interdimensional sickness and collapse?”

Brenner shrugged delicately. “I certainly won’t make any promises.”

Max was pretty sure the whole thing could have and would have gone on forever, if not for the sudden appearance of one very angry and very much alive Indian woman. One second she wasn’t there, and then she was standing in front of Brenner. He had a split second to register shock on his face. 

“Goodbye,” she said succinctly, put a gun to his forehead, and pulled the trigger.

He went down. 

Max didn’t even have time to flinch - God, they hated guns, they would never get used to that sound - but at least they saw Will had his hands over Jane’s eyes. 

Lucas hissed. “Oh, that’s...that’s going to be some trauma.” 

“For who?” Max asked. 

“Both of them.”

“What the _fuck_ did you do?” Hopper roared. 

Kali blinked at him slowly. “I think it’s very obvious, policeman.” She gestured towards the corpse. “I solved our problem.”

“You committed murder!” 

“Which was the solution to our problem.” She clearly had no understanding of the Chief’s ire. 

“That makes you no better than he is!” Hopper protested.

Kali snorted. “Oh. That’s what this is. I don’t know, I think that because he tortured eleven individuals and performed experiments on them, and is responsible for the death of eight of those subjects as well as the permanent disability of another one - I think I can still say I’m better than he is, especially considering I’m the one who stopped him before he could do any more damage.”

Karen looked shell-shocked but she finally found her voice. “He was in cuffs!”

“You heard the man,” Kali replied. “He wasn’t going to go to jail, and he wasn’t going to stop running dangerous and unethical experiments.”

Joyce ran a hand through her hair anxiously. “This was the only way out,” she said flatly.

“Absolutely not!” Hopper refused to accept this, looking at Joyce with some measure of betrayal.

Kali cocked her head. “I suppose we’ll have to - what is it you people say? - ‘agree to disagree,’” she declared with a shrug. “Now come on, we have to clean up the building.”

Max didn’t know what she meant by “clean up” until they made it outside and saw little bits of explosives around the perimeter. They also saw Axel for the first time in a while. 

“Was this your errand?” they asked with a grin, making their way over from where Mike was leaning heavily on Lucas.

Axel grinned wolfishly. “Hell yeah.” He handed them a bottle with a rag coming out of the top. “Vive la revolution or some shit,” he said in the world’s most terrible French, then pushed a button.

Max had never heard a sound so loud, and they doubted they ever would again. The ground shook and they stumbled as the building started to fall, kicking up clouds of dirt and dust and rubble. It was a glorious display of destruction. 

“Here you go,” Axel offered, holding out a lighter. “Set it and throw.”

The fire burned beautifully but Max had to let it go, so they lobbed it as hard as they could into the debris. A few more bottles followed suit until things began to catch. 

Max whooped. This was definitely fun. 

“Hell yeah, Li’l Punk.” Axel fist bumped them and handed over another bottle. “Do it again!”

Max wound up throwing four molotov cocktails in total, beaming like a lunatic after each, and also wound up with a couple of the pins off Axel’s jacket to put on their own.

“S’better than therapy,” they told Lucas, giddy. 

He laughed and rolled his eyes. “That’s cuz your adrenaline hasn’t tanked yet. C’mon.” He jerked his head in the direction of his car. “Let’s get this disaster to the hospital.” 

There was no question whether Max would come. It was the three of them.

It had always been the three of them.

* * *

Mike was informed by the doctors that he was lucky the bullet had just nicked him; the reason he’d lost so much blood was because he had a “low clotting factor” or something. 

“Eat more red meat, son,” the doctor told him with a pat on the shoulder, and then he was being released. 

“I can’t believe I freaked out because you’re iron deficient,” Max huffed, meeting him in the waiting room. Now that he was obviously fine, they felt no need to dote on him, clearly. 

He wouldn’t lie, he missed it a little. 

“How’re you doing? Do you need to lean on me?” Of course, if he wanted doting, Lucas was readily available. 

He waved the man away, blushing slightly. “I’m fine, Lucas,” he promised, dodging the teasing look Max was giving him.

Oh dear god, his mother had probably seen his hickeys. He groaned and buried his face in his hands. 

“Baby, what’s wrong?” Lucas asked, intensely concerned. “Does it hurt? Do you need more painkillers?”

Mike wasn’t sure when he’d become ‘baby’ but he found he rather liked it. “Nothing, it’s just knowing I am going to have to face my mother with hickeys poking out of my collar like a fucking high schooler.”

Max doubled over with laughter, and Lucas couldn’t help his smile. It was the closest any of them had come to discussing what happened last night - or this morning, or in the lab. Mike both desperately wanted to talk about it and didn’t.

Max took shotgun. “You’re injured so I can’t kick you,” they explained. “So you get to sit in the back.”

“Thank you for your kindness and consideration,” Mike drawled. 

They were going back to his sister’s house, because that’s where everyone who didn’t get (nonlethally) shot wound up regrouping. Lucas and Max had insisted on being the ones to take him to the hospital, not that he was complaining.

Finally, Max broke the silence. “You like guys?”

Lucas didn’t take his eyes off the road. “Uh, yeah? I’m bisexual, Max, we’ve known this for years!”

“I haven’t!” 

Mike also hadn’t, but then, he hadn’t spent the past four years in Chicago with them.

“I went to Pride with you every summer!” Lucas protested. 

“I thought you were just being supportive of me!”

“By wearing a bi pride flag?” 

Max had no good comeback for that one. They just sat scowling with their arms crossed and their face in flames.

Mike said absolutely nothing about it, and neither of them spoke the rest of the way to Nancy’s place.

He made it into the living room, leaning heavily on Lucas - perhaps more heavily than necessary, if pressed - and collapsed into a chair. The first person he laid eyes on was Kali.

“I saw you die,” he said in lieu of greeting. “How are you not dead?”

He’d thought, at first, that she was a blood loss induced hallucination, but here she was in front of him and alive. 

She smirked and waved her hand, and then there were two of her. “My power is illusions,” she reminded him. “You see what I want you to see.” She waved her hand and three demogorgons appeared. Mike stifled a scream. Then they were gone again in the span of time it took him to blink.

“I knew that was you!” Will declared, coming over to sit on the side of Mike’s chair. “I was confused when my bullet went straight through it.”

“So you planned to fake your own death from the beginning?” Mike asked. He kind of wished he had his notepad here. This would make an excellent comic book.

Kali nodded. “I knew he’d let his guard down if he thought I was dead. Dottie rigged the machine to blow, I just timed my illusions properly.”

“Wait, were the demogorgons I saw an illusion too?” Nancy asked, sipping tea on the couch. 

“Yes. You coming along was not part of the plan,” Mick explained from where she stood next to Kali. “When things went remotely wrong we needed to get you out of there.”

“You realize you traumatized Jane, right?” Lucas cut in. Mike turned around to look at him in shock, but his voice was hard.

Kali waved her hand dismissively. “She’ll get over it.”

“Not without help,” he replied, frowning. “I can’t believe you made your little sister watch your faked death.”

“None of you were part of the plan!” Kali protested. “We had to improvise something we’ve been planning for years.”

Mike whistled. Years. “So how does it feel to have completed your revenge quest?” he asked. 

“Pretty damn good,” Kali replied with a grin. “Though I’ll need a new quest pretty soon.”

Jane was curled up at Kali’s feet, leaning against her knees. “Happy you’re not dead.”

“I’m happy, too, kiddo,” Mick replied, leaning down to ruffle Jane’s hair. “And we’re sorry for scaring you like that.”

“It’s okay.”

Mike could see in Jane’s eyes that it was very much not okay, but he wasn’t going to say anything. “The door is closed?” he asked instead.

Kali nodded. “And the weird plants are gone from the generator. They did a great job.” 

“You can go back to work tomorrow,” Max teased. 

Mike snorted. “Joy.” Though he had definitely missed the tips.

His mother and Joyce were in the kitchen discussing baking with Funshine, and he knew the others were elsewhere in the house. But for now, he was content to sit there with Max and Lucas’ hands on his shoulders and to lean back into the chair. Now that it was all over.

Maybe he would even sleep during the day, not because he had to, but because he wanted to.


	9. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Everyone gets their happy endings; only content warnings are about Kali processing the abuse she faced.

**October 2015**

“Wait. That’s it?”

“What do you mean ‘that’s it?’ We defeated the evil scientist and burned the building to the ground, what more do you want?”

“Well, for starters, did you ever learn about racism?”

“Hey!”

“I mean, obviously he did, otherwise I wouldn’t have married him.”

“Lucas -”

“And what about the girl! Eleven-Jane! What happened to her?”

“Also how did you finally get your shit together and date?”

“Jesus, Jesus, okay, we’ll give you the epilogue.”

* * *

“Hey.” 

Kali raised an eyebrow. She hadn’t expected anyone to come see them off after saying her goodbyes to Jane. “Hello.” 

Lucas held out a bottle of cream soda and a bottle of cola. “Wasn’t sure which you’d prefer.”

She took the cream soda. It was a luxury. “Thank you.”

They sat in silence on the back of the van. Her companions were elsewhere - Dottie was saying her last goodbyes to Dustin, Axel to Max, Funshine was having a glass of wine with the four women Kali surmised were the mothers of some members of Jane’s new friends. 

She had no idea where her girlfriend was, which was suspicious.

“Are you okay?” Lucas asked finally.

“Of course I am,” she replied without missing a beat, ignoring the edges of her consciousness that had been attempting to come loose over the past few days. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Well, you were raised in a lab and abused in the name of science - I know some of what they did for that study, but I won’t bring it up, I don’t want to upset you - and then you just shot the man responsible for it point blank a couple days ago, ending the revenge quest that’s been your primary motivation for years.”

Kali squinted at him. “You aren’t like me or Jane,” she said, though it felt like more of a question.

“Correct.” Lucas raised an eyebrow, clearly unsure where she was going with that.

“How do you - do that?” she asked. “Cut down to the heart of my problems and make me face them with just a few words?”

Lucas smiled. “I’m good at my job,” he replied. “I’m a therapist.” She did know this. “But I’m a therapist for...people like us.”

It took Kali a second to figure out what commonality she had with Lucas. It was an embarrassing second that she would never admit to, that she spent distracted by wondering if he _did_ actually have powers. 

“Ah,” she said finally.

“You’re from Chicago?” he asked. She nodded. “Max and I got full ride scholarships to University of Chicago for undergrad; we lived there for four years.”

Kali whistled. “That’s an expensive school.” 

“In the poorest neighborhoods.” Lucas nodded. “I did a lot of clinical work in Englewood and Hyde Park.”

“We’re around there sometimes,” Kali replied. “We sort of drift around avoiding cops and going where people need us.”

Lucas raised his bottle. “Fuck CPD,” he declared, and took a swig.

“ _Fuck_ CPD,” she agreed, giving him a genuine smile.

They drank in silence a while longer. “He never touched me,” Kali said finally. Lucas said nothing, just waited for her to go on. “He only - you know - to Terry. But I was always terrified he would try.” She sighed. “I’ve been cut and poked and prodded and fed drugs you don’t even know exist. Of course I’m angry.”

“Of course,” Lucas echoed.

“And then I get out into the real world and it’s not all that much better, you know, people getting shot by cops and kids starving on street corners, but at least I’m _free_. But I always kept going off that anger.”

“Are you still angry?” Lucas asked softly.

Kali took a minute to actually think about it. “Yeah,” she said. “Yeah, I think so. Killing Brenner helped a little bit, but I’m still mad about what happened to me.”

“It wasn’t fair.” Lucas took another sip of his soda. He alternated between watching her intently and staring out into nothing; it felt almost like he knew when his gaze was getting uncomfortable. 

“They took me away from my mother. The Child Protection Services in London.” She suddenly wished that the cream soda was something a little stronger. “Gave me to a couple of white Anglican do-gooders. Pamela and Frank. I was always too much for them, so when they heard about the study - I don’t know how, Frank worked in the government or something - they were so happy to get rid of me. Ship me overseas. Some parents.”

“They were supposed to protect you, and they didn’t,” Lucas observed. 

“I’ve got a family here now. Mick and Dottie and Fun and Axel. You know, Fun is the one who found me my first night in Chicago. He gave me a pair of shoes, cuz I didn’t have any and my feet were wet.” To some, it was probably a depressing memory, but even now it made Kali smile. “He just saw this random teenage girl on the street and gave her shoes and food and let her stay in his shitty apartment awhile.”

Lucas smiled at that. “He’s a good man.”

“The best,” Kali agreed. She felt tight in her chest, something rattling around. “I don’t - I never talk about this,” she added. “It feels -” 

He waited for her to find the words, but when she didn’t, he just smiled reassuringly. “It feels like this at first,” he promised. “It’s part of healing.”

Huh. Healing. Kali had never really thought about whether that was possible for herself or not. Maybe now that Brenner was dead, that could be the next thing she focused on. 

“Listen, I’ve gotta go, but…” Lucas handed her a business card. “If you ever need anything. If you ever want to talk to someone who knows what happened.”

Kali tucked it into the inner pocket of her leather jacket, the one that sat right over her heart. “Thank you,” she said, feeling how genuine it was. And as she watched him walk away, she realized that she probably would give him a call.

* * *

Nancy, for the first time in as long as she could remember, was at peace. 

“Look at that.” Steve grinned, poking at the headline. “That’s our girl!”

_Ex-Government Scientist Conducts Independent Experiments, Endangers Small Midwestern Town  
By Nancy Wheeler, Freelancer_

Nothing like playing on sympathies and nostalgia for the “Smaller Communities” or whatever, Nancy reasoned. 

“Sure is.” Jonathan dropped a kiss on the top of her head. “God, I bet Tom was _so_ mad you sold this to the Sun-Times and he gets nothing for it.”

Nancy grinned wickedly. “Livid.”

_“The parents of Barbara Holland, who disappeared twelve years ago, are suing the US Department of Energy for not properly controlling the man responsible for their daughter’s death.”_

Finally, she could breathe again. 

“I still can’t believe we have to go back and see Murray again,” Steve grumbled. “Fuck that guy.”

Nancy laughed. “You two don’t have to come see him, I can go by myself,” she suggested. 

“Absolutely not,” Steve replied. “You need backup with a guy like that.”

_“‘He took my sister,’ said Becky Ives of Indianapolis, whose sister Terry was one of Dr. Martin Brenner’s victims. ‘He took a young, impressionable woman and told her she was going to help him make the world a better place, and then he drugged her and abused her and took away that spark of light.’”_

So they all went. Nancy insisted on stopping off to buy the man a bottle of tequila - it was only fair, all things considered - and then they were on their way. This ride was the opposite of the last one, filled with laughter and devoid of tension. Nancy held Steve’s hand on the highway and Jonathan’s the whole time, and she smiled so much her face hurt. 

Murray noticed, because of course he did, even when they stopped holding hands before getting out of the car. “‘Bout damn time,” he commented smugly as he opened the door. “Oh, why thank you!”

“You know why we’re here,” Nancy prodded. 

“To celebrate, of course.” Murray whisked them inside, did up his seven locks, and started pouring drinks. 

Steve declined. “I’m driving.”

“Aw, but you could stay,” he teased. 

“Absolutely not,” Nancy replied, draining half the glass already. “Now come on, I’ve been dreaming about tearing down this wall for years.”

Murray chuckled. “You and me both, sweetheart.”

_“An anonymous source who asked only to be identified by the name ‘Kali’ talked about some of the abuse she faced. ‘He was always poking us with different needles, cutting us up, taking blood samples. He thought if he pushed us past our breaking point, he’d get the results he wanted.’”_

She wouldn’t say they _raced_ to his conspiracy room, but it was definitely a brisk walk. She made it in and grabbed a piece of paper without thinking, without looking, and _tore_.

It made a satisfying sound.

“‘Atta girl!” Murray cheered, taking fistfulls of his own. “It’s over. We did it.”

Nancy raised her eyebrows but didn’t correct him, choosing instead to throw more papers into the rapidly growing pile in the middle of the floor. “What are we going to do with all of this?” she asked, peeling Barb’s obituary down and crumpling it up.

“I was thinking we roast marshmallows,” Murray replied blithely. At her disbelieving look, he added, “I’m only half joking. But we should burn all of these.”

“That sounds cathartic,” Nancy agreed. Apparently her younger brother and his friends had been able to burn down the lab. Nancy was sad that she missed it, but as Steve and Jonathan came up to hover near her, she couldn’t really say she regretted it.

_“It is unclear what exactly happened to Barbara Holland, as none of Brenner’s other victims recall seeing him perform tests on her. However, her personal effects were found in the lab as officials went to clear it out. It is likely she met up with one of his more dangerous substances wholly by accident.”_

Fire was some sort of metaphor for cleansing and rebirth, according to Nancy’s eleventh grade English teacher. As she watched the news article about Barb’s disappearance curl to ashes, she could understand why.

Steve stood on one side holding her hand, and Jonathan on the other, and Barb could loosen her vice grip on Nancy’s heart just enough for Nancy to live her life now.

Will had come to her in tears a few days after the events. “I saw her,” he’d said.

Suddenly, his guilty face had made a hell of a lot more sense.

One long conversation later, Will was promised she didn’t blame him, and Nancy had the last little bits of closure she needed. In a way, she wished she could’ve seen this Not-Barb one last time, but Will said she was cruel, and Barb was never cruel. Better to leave her memory untainted by shadow facsimiles.

_“Not all of Brenner’s victims have been uncovered. Besides Kali and Terry Ives, there are estimated to have been nine other people he treated as test subjects, including Terry’s infant daughter.”_

“You have the papers?” Nancy confirmed. She wondered what sort of friendship they had if Murray wouldn’t even tell Hopper where he lived, but it seemed like he wanted to keep the knowledge to just the three people in his living room.

“Of course.” Murray handed her a manilla envelope. It was heavier than expected. “Birth certificate for one Jane Ives Hopper, in there. Past 6 years of school records, check. I didn’t bother with the medical records in full, but I have documentation on her learning disability that makes speech and reading difficult. I still think Hopper should wait a year to put her in school, though; the timing is too on the nose otherwise.”

Nancy saluted. “Duly noted.” The girl probably needed some therapy (a lot, according to Lucas) before she went to public school, anyway. Especially in Hawkins, Indiana. “Is it really a good idea to have Jane so easily tied to the lab?” she asked skeptically.

“The easiest story is that Hopper hooked up with the woman when she was in town so the kid’s his, indisputably. Besides, you didn’t name the girl in your article, right? So only the people who look on her birth certificate will even see the name she’s connected to.”

Nancy nodded. She could understand that.

“Tell your mothers I say hello!” Murray waved as the three of them got back into the car.

“I will not,” Nancy answered shortly. Karen had...strong feelings about Murray Bauman. 

Joyce could tolerate the man (even seemed to like him sometimes), though, so she’d probably appreciate the greeting.

After they got in the car, Nancy made sure to kiss Steve, and then Jonathan, flipping two middle fingers at Murray. He was shouting something and laughing, but she couldn’t hear it and that’s how she liked it as they drove away. Besides, they were all laughing, too.

Murder solved, love triangle resolved, bad guy defeated; it was a classic happy ending.

_“At the time of publication, Dr. Martin Brenner could not be reached for comment.”_

* * *

They’d been skating around it for years, but something about parallel dimensions and near-death experiences tended to kick your ass into gear. The first minute Dustin got Will alone, he’d kissed him within an inch of his life.

Will wasn’t necessarily prepared, even though he’d kind of known they had a thing for a long time, but he couldn’t say he regretted it. Now that things were calmer, that he’d gained a lot of dimensional clarity, he was in a perfect place to _do_ something about all this.

“You’re a dumbass,” he said over a strawberry milkshake on their first “real” date.

“Yeah, probably.” Dustin grinned, slurping his chocolate. He had whipped cream on his nose already. “What are you referring to, though?”

“Taking home a demogorgon baby from an alternate dimension in the name of science.”

Dustin hummed. “I stand by that decision.” He thought for a second. “Okay, well, no. I wouldn’t do it again, but it made perfect sense at the time with the information I had.”

Will rolled his eyes and slurped his milkshake noisily, pointedly. Dustin laughed. “Everything you do makes perfect sense to you, at least at the time.”

“Not everything,” Dustin pointed out. “I have no idea why it took me four years to kiss you.”

Will blushed and kicked Dustin under the table. Something about him made Will feel like a kid all over again, in the best way. Like every day was a fun new adventure to wake up to, and you could just say cute romantic shit whenever you wanted. 

His face hurt from smiling. 

“So, uh, not to rush things or whatever, but -” Dustin scratched the back of his neck anxiously. “Well. Ms - Susan is staying with my mom for the foreseeable future. And I think they might be - um.” Dustin’s face got red. “Yeah. Anyway, they’re living together, and now Max is staying with Mike and then there’s Lucas and we all know how that’s gonna turn out -” He tripped over his words again. “I guess, do you want to - do you want to finally get that place together like we talked about last year?”

Will’s heart swooped. 

A week ago, he thought he’d never work up the courage to actually tell Dustin how he felt. Now, the offer on the table -

A week ago, he would have been entirely too scared to do it. But in that week, he’d fought monsters and evil men, hopped through dimensions, and realized he had superpowers. He didn’t know if the feeling in his gut was a premonition or just hope, but it was telling him to go for it.

“Yes.” He grinned. “Let’s do it.”

* * *

Joyce hadn’t been on a road trip with Hopper since high school.

Hop and Lonnie had already graduated, and it was just before her senior year, back when they were doing...whatever it was they were doing. She’d always told them she wouldn’t choose, and they’d always said they were okay with that. 

Right up until they weren’t.

They’d gone to Chicago, just to prove they could, and they’d seen a show in Second City (to date one of the most expensive things Joyce has ever done) and gone to a baseball game and had a quite frankly absurd amount of sex in a cheap, shitty motel.

Boy, things had changed.

Hopper was driving (like last time), and Karen was in the passenger’s seat (not like last time). Like last time, though, she somehow found herself in love with the both of them. 

Karen knew. Karen had always known. One of the first nights they’d spent together, wine drunk and basking in the happiness of their newfound relationship, Karen said, “You know, I always thought you and Jim were gonna get married,” and Joyce didn’t say, ‘Me too,’ but she meant it as close as you can get when you’re in love with two people. 

Karen had never begrudged her for it. Karen had apologized for calling her a slut back in high school. 

Joyce had kissed her to shut her up. 

Unlike last time, there was a child in the car, a child who was hers and yet wasn’t, who she and Hopper and Karen had all agreed to take responsibility for. A child they were driving to meet the mother she’d never known after helping her escape the man who’d held her captive all these years. 

Joyce needed a smoke. 

Becky Ives was beautiful, and she looked like a woman reborn when she laid eyes on her niece. Joyce watched the years slip off her face. 

“Hi, Janey,” she cooed. “I’m your mom’s sister. I’m Aunt Becky.”

Becky apparently handled anxiety the same way Karen did, so when she invited them inside for lunch, Joyce was overwhelmed by the array of tiny sandwiches and vegetables and cheese and crackers. 

“I wasn’t sure what would suit your tastes.” Becky laughed self-deprecatingly. 

Karen put on her most winning smile. “This is perfect,” she promised. 

Jane was shy at first, but Becky’s easy love made her relax into the space, even offering a few sentences, though mostly she preferred “yes” or “no.” She’d never tasted most of the food on the table: raw broccoli and cauliflower were out, but tomatoes and cucumbers suited her fancy.

“I was thinking of suing the government, you know, like that girl’s parents are doing,” Becky said, drinking her water. “But I got a check in the mail for signing a paper saying I’d never talk about it again. It’s enough for us to get by a little easier.”

Joyce’s heart fell, but it was Hopper who asked gruffly, “Does that mean you’d like us to leave Jane here?”

Becky shook her head quickly. “God, no, not that much money. Enough that I’m pretty sure I can keep the lights on and the fridge stocked while I save up a bit.” She exhaled slowly. “I love her, but she’ll have a better life with you all.”

“Thank you for your trust.” Joyce smiled what she hoped was reassuringly, but she’d never had the people skills Karen did. 

Becky nodded. “Would you like to meet Terry?” she suggested when they finished eating, starting to clear the plates. Karen immediately began to help. “I mean, so much as anyone can meet her these days.”

Jane walked in first, the rest of them following behind her. “Mama,” she breathed.

There was a little TV on a dresser playing static, and Joyce nearly jumped when it changed to some soap opera. All she could make out was the word “Daughter,” but it was enough. Then it was back to static.

“Miss you,” Jane said, folding her knees under herself and sitting on the floor in front of her mother. 

Joyce _really_ needed that smoke.

She stood on the porch with her hands shaking. It took her two tries to light the cigarette. The woman looked not even halfway past thirty, meaning she would have been maybe twenty-one when she gave birth. 

Joyce got pregnant on prom night; the timing matched up, and she’d been particularly neurotic about it. That’s also how she knew the baby was Lonnie’s, because she and Hopper hadn’t been together around that time. 

Everyone said she got knocked up earlier, but it’s really that Jonathan was born early. He had been so goddamn small in her arms, like holding a peanut. Lonnie hadn’t been at the hospital; Hopper was. Jonathan’s birthday was approximately 21 days before the fight that changed everything.

“You alright?” Hop asked, settling in next to her on the porch with his own cigarette. 

She wheezed. Not really. “That could’ve been me, Hop,” she said softly. “That could’ve been my babies, Will or Jonathan; they’ve got the same type of powers as Jane does, apparently.” None of this made any goddamn sense, but she had the rest of her life to figure it out.

Hopper nodded. “That’s what I think every time I look at your boys,” he confessed quietly. “But everyone’s safe now.”

“Twelve years - with a father like that -” Joyce broke off. “You were right, you know. I never said it, but you were.”

“About what?”

“I should’ve picked you. The first time Lonnie ever threw a bottle at me” - also prom night - “I should have left his ass. I should have married you. Maybe then Will and Jonathan wouldn’t be so -” She waved her hand. 

Hopper sighed. “Your boys are perfect, Joyce,” he promised. “No matter what kind of shit Lonnie put them through. It’s not your fault, I didn’t say what I was trying to say right.” He sighed. “I made peace with it. I missed my chance.”

She glanced at him sidelong. “Want a second?” she offered tentatively.

Instead of answering, he dropped his cigarette on the concrete porch, took her face in both hands, and kissed her.

More than twenty-five years later, it felt like coming home.

“Well, it’s about damn time,” Karen teased, shutting the door behind her quietly. “I see you two have reached some sort of understanding?” 

Hopper was blushing more than Joyce was, probably only because Joyce was so used to Karen at this point. “We’re getting there,” she confirmed, and then she leaned over to kiss Karen, too. 

“Good.” Karen grinned. “Becky is giving Jane some of her mom’s things and then we’ll be ready to go home.” She tilted her chin at Hopper. “I take it you’ll be staying?” He nodded.

Joyce wondered, briefly, how the hell she’d gotten this lucky. Then again, after all the shit the universe put her through, she deserved it.

* * *

“What are you reading?” Lucas was pretty sure he spent more time at Mike’s house than his own, especially now that Max lived there too, but the giant pile of books on the coffee table was new. 

Mike held up the book, not stopping his read, and Lucas read the title _Words That Wound_. “Is that Kimberlé Crenshaw?”

Max walked into the living room with a mug of coffee and an apple. “Yeah. He said he wanted to know what that ‘Critical Race Theory’ thing you mentioned was so I took him to this one bookstore near campus in Indianapolis and we basically bought out the whole section on race, gender, sexuality, class…”

“Ability,” Mike added. “There’s one in here about including disabled kids in regular public schooling.”

Lucas blinked slowly. “Damn.”

Mike grabbed a random scrap of something - a post-it note maybe? - and put it between the pages like a bookmark. “This past week has made me realize there’s...a lot I don’t know.”

Lucas raised an eyebrow and gestured for him to continue. 

“I’ve never been outside of Hawkins,” Mike added, “and...I’ve never really had to think about any of this stuff, except maybe being gay and being poor now. But these are like - revolution books.” Mike gestured at the stacks. “I’ve realized that there’s so much I don’t know. That I should know.”

“And you’re not just reading this cuz I told you to?” Lucas asked, because it felt like the kind of thing Mike might do, take it as a directive.

Mike shook his head. “I just - if I’m going to be a writer, and I’m going to tell different stories, I need to know all sorts of experiences besides my own. I’m not like...trying to impress you or pretend I know more than I do.”

Lucas hummed. “Good for you,” he said, and then went to the kitchen to make himself a snack. There was still coffee leftover in the pot Max had brewed, so he took some of that with a bit of milk, and an old cinnamon bun off the counter. 

They needed to talk about it. _He_ needed to talk about it because he was vibrating out of his skin with the uncertainty of it all. Yet he had no idea where even to begin or how to say it or what he wanted. 

Well, no. He knew what he wanted, at least.

_What would you tell a client?_ he asked himself, but that question proved as effective as usual, which is to say almost not at all. _Start with what you’re feeling. Ask questions._ He knew all that already.

He sat down on a chair in the living room and watched Max read their textbook and Mike read his Critical Race Theory Book, and he squirmed. Okay. God. He could do it.

“Are we gonna talk about this?” he asked, sipping his coffee.

“Talk about what?” Max asked with a carefully neutral expression.

“You live in Mike’s house and are sharing a bed, you made out with him at least once, I kissed him, you and I have...whatever the hell it’s been these past few years, and then you got in a fight with me because you didn’t realize I was bisexual and then we haven’t said anything about any of it since.” Lucas exhaled. It felt nice to just lay all of that out there. “I’m trying to understand here, but I need y’all to help me out.”

Mike’s face was beet red and Max was staring at him mutinously. God, of course, how dare he ask them to talk about feelings. 

“Fine. I’ll start. Max, I’m in love with you, I always have been and I never stopped, and I love what we have but I miss what we could be. It seems sometimes like you want it too, but then you’re shoving me away again. And Mike - I’m in love with you too. I never wanted to make you uncomfortable or anything, and then we went off to college and -” He cut himself off. “Somebody else please say something so I stop rambling through my anxiety.”

Self-awareness was a blessing and a curse.

The silence stretched on awkwardly but Lucas was used to waiting out reluctant clients. He could sit here all day. He didn’t know how his own feelings would impact that, but he could at least try.

“How long?” Mike asked quietly.

Lucas ran a quick calculation. “Uh. Six years?”

Mike got redder, which Lucas had not expected possible. “Oh. I - Well, I think I’ve felt it that long, but I just figured it out,” he said sheepishly. “When you were singing along to my records. You looked - you were perfect.”

Lucas felt a sort of warmth fill him, coupled with relief. “Okay. Okay, cool.”

“But I also love Max, I think,” Mike added. “It’s, uh - all this is kind of a recent set of revelations. But I love you both.”

Max was staring steadfastly at their lap as Mike and Lucas turned to look at them. No one said a word. 

Finally, they managed a small, “I thought you only liked girls.”

“Max, I like _you_ ,” Lucas insisted. “Even without you knowing I like guys.”

“I thought - I thought you liked me because I was something like a girl.” They buried their face in their hands. “I am beginning to feel like I might’ve done something stupid,” they added, muffled.

Lucas let out a mildly hysterical laugh. “Wouldn’t be the first time,” he teased, which earned him a glare from Max, but at least it got their hands off their face. “What stupid?”

“I never stopped loving you, either,” Max said softly. “I meant what I said - I can’t be your girlfriend.”

“What about my boyfriend?” Lucas asked. Suddenly everything made so much more sense, like pieces of his life turning and clicking into place. “Or partner, or we can make up some new word?”

Max nodded slowly. “I think I’d like to try that.” They looked over at Mike and scoffed, and Lucas almost laughed at their utter reluctance to show vulnerability. “And I guess I love you too, Wheeler,” they grumbled.

Mike stuck his tongue out at them, his blush having faded somewhat. They stuck theirs out right back. Lucas found this just as endearing as he did annoying. 

“ _Why_ am I in love with you two?’ he asked, mostly to himself.

Max shrugged. “I dunno. Your weird decision, dude.” And then they were smirking, and Lucas had an inkling what was coming next. He managed to put his coffee mug to the side just in time for Max to launch themself into his lap and kiss him like their life depended on it. 

God, he’d missed their lips, always just a bit rough and raw from their nervous habits, but still immensely soft, and always feeling like they’d been made to press against his. Even and especially when they were smiling into a kiss.

“Fuck, I missed that,” Max exclaimed, panting when they pulled back. 

Mike made a very disgruntled squeak. When Lucas and Max looked over, his face was back to fully bright red. 

“There’s some for you over here, too,” Lucas promised, and then Mike was scrambling to his feet with all of his graceless charm and hurrying over to also plant himself in Lucas’ lap. 

He’d never dreamed he could be so lucky as he ran his hand softly over Mike’s cheek - god, his skin was so smooth - to tangle it in his hair and pull him in for a kiss. Kissing Mike felt different, but just as perfect, and Lucas tried to make this one last a little longer and better to make up for the “We were in a life or death situation the first time I kissed you” thing. 

Judging by Mike’s blown pupils and heavy breathing when he pulled back, Lucas would say he succeeded. 

“You’re so cute,” Max crooned, getting even more of a blush as they leaned over to nibble on his neck. “Lucas, I think this might be the best idea you’ve ever had.”

As he pulled Mike in for another kiss, he couldn’t help but agree.

Of course, the conversation was only actually halfway done. “So are you going to keep living here?” Lucas asked.

Max looked at Mike. 

“Will and Dustin are moving out together, apparently,” Mike said, making a face. “So you could have Will’s old room and make it yours.”

That was a good idea, because Max definitely needed their own space. Lucas could imagine the headache if they were stuck around Mike (or him) all the time with nowhere to escape to. 

“Thanks.” They glanced at him sideways. “I - want to keep sleeping together at least sometimes, though.”

Mike nodded vigorously. “Me too.” He looked over at Lucas. “And - you could stay too, sometimes. If you want.”

Lucas smiled. “I’d like that,” he assured. “Sounds cozy.”

Both Mike and Max snuggled closer, content. The chair really wasn’t meant for three people, but Lucas really didn’t care.

“And just to be completely clear, I am dating both of you and you are dating each other?” Lucas raised an eyebrow. This conversation was like pulling teeth.

Max groaned. “God, yes, we established this, why do you have to over-communicate everything?” The blush on their face belied their embarrassment.

“Because you under-communicate,” Lucas replied with fond exasperation, “since you’re allergic to emotional vulnerability, which means we average out into a normal amount of communication.”

Lucas let them cuddle in peace, satisfied the important details had been explicitly discussed, and wrapped an arm around each of his partners. God, if his sixteen-year-old self could see him now.

The fact he’d managed to get Mike and Max to cuddle peacefully against him with no bickering was miracle enough.

It was Mike who broke the silence this time. “I’ve been thinking about Chicago,” he said shyly. 

“Yeah?” Lucas asked. “What about it?”

“I think I want to go,” Mike replied. “I - I’m so sick of Hawkins, I want something _more_. I think I could make a life there that I actually want to live.”

And god, wouldn’t that be something? For all of them. 

“Well, I always planned on going back,” Lucas replied. “Maybe after Max graduates…”

Max nodded into his neck. “I miss it all the time,” they added.

“So Chicago it is.” Lucas smiled and kissed both of his partners on their foreheads. He couldn’t wait to see where this adventure would take them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Congratulations, you did it. You reached the end of what is basically a novel I wrote. Did I intend for it to get this long? No. When I started writing it was just a little draft labeled "MadWheelClair Waffle House AU" and I thought it'd hit maybe 20k. Clearly that wasn't the case.  
> But I'm happy with it. It turned into a really great epic adventure and I got to explore some really interesting things, from the mechanics of the Upside Down to people's different ways of processing trauma. Plus the easter eggs I got to throw in. It was an exceptional journey to write; I hope it was just as satisfying to read.  
> Thank you for your readership! I love to hear your thoughts. Until next time,  
> Azure
> 
> P.S. Thank you again to [Pterawaters](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pterawaters/pseuds/pterawaters) for the [lovely soundtrack](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0wkWDYQBCCyLCpJyxe2c0l?si=8o45PWGrTEibS4M0dRHoeQ) that accompanies this fic!

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Fanmix for "Dead Ends and Second Chances"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27427858) by [pterawaters](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pterawaters/pseuds/pterawaters)




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